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CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


BY 

BEATRICE GRIMSHAW 


The Terrible Island 
My South Sea Sweetheart 


^ CONN 

OF THE CORAL SEAS 


BEATRICE ^GRIMSHAW / 

f< II 


fork 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
1922 

zf// rights reserved 


PRINTED IN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 




Copyright, 1922 

By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 



Set up and electrotyped. Published January, 1922 


i 

JAN 12 1922 


FERRIS PRINTING COMPANY 
NEW YORK 



(7 


©n!.A654240 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 













CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

CHAPTER I 

I T was in the days of Edward, at Meliasi, capital 
of the New Cumberland Islands. 

It was night, and Meliasi was quiet. Meliasi was 
usually quiet — forty-one nights out of every forty- 
two to be explicit. On the forty-second night, the 
Brand Peters boat came in, and the capital to the 
end of its one and a half streets, and the last of its 
nineteen houses, burst into brief and vivid flower. 
Cocoanut torches flared; red-glassed hurricane 
lamps, unsteadily displayed by New Cumberland 
cannibals dancing the waves in canoes, warned the 
Brand Peters boat not to tear out her vitals on either 
end of a singularly vicious coral reef; bags of copra, 
of ivory nuts, fungus, pearl-shell, coffee, bush-vine 
rubber, were hurried down the wharf; everyone in 
the township recklessly asked everyone else to din- 
ner, in view of the coming rare feast of fresh meats; 
the one hotel turned up its proprietorial sleeves, 
rolled out barrels of beer, brought forth cases of 
whisky, and set canvas stretchers, prudently, in the 
shades of the back verandah. ... 

On the forty-one other nights, Meliasi went to 
bed at eight o’clock in the mosquito season and at 
half past nine in the “south-east.” If you and an- 
other gentleman, or several other gentlemen, hap- 
pened to be playing poker, you might, of course, 
prefer to go on until daylight, with a “lay-off” of 
1 


2 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


an hour or so somewhere about twelve; or if you and 
yet another gentleman, French or English, hap- 
pened to disagree, as gentlemen will over the cards 
or the dice, you might like to throw a knife at the 
other gentleman, or draw your Smith and Wesson 
to emphasize your views; and this might — as indeed 
it sometimes did — create such strong local interest, 
that Meliasi would get up from its beds and mos- 
quito nets, and come out in its pajamas to argue 
about the result, and call for the cooky boys who, 
by common consent, were made to do all the burying. 

But generally speaking, the town was quiet o’ 
nights. Wonderfully quiet, when you came to 
realize that the New Cumberlands by reason of the 
rivalries of two great European powers, were, in 
those days of Edward, the last, only spot upon 
‘earth’s surface where nobody (except the cannibals, 
who, of course, were nobody, anyhow) owned any- 
thing at all, where there was no Government, no 
police, and consequently no law. 

There was a British Commissioner perched on 
the top of a high hill, like St. Simeon Stylites on his 
tower (and not at all like any saint in any other 
way). There was a French Commissioner who ran 
a plantation on an island across the bay, and held, 
as did his brother of Great Britain, a watching 
brief for his country. They both watched — by ask- 
ing each other to dinner, and making things pleasant 
for rare birds of steamer passengers. Also they ran 
in stray New Cumbe^rlandians who had shot white 
men (especially if the New Cumberlandian, impru- 
dently, had eaten his game as well), and kept them 
for the next calling man-of-war, which promptly 
hanged them on general principles. Also they shut 
their eyes, as much as seemed good. . . . 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


3 


The British Commissioner, on this quiet night, 
was engaged in watching his French confrere. His 
French confrere had watched him the last Sunday. 
(It was fresh turtle steak, dugong bacon, a salad 
and an omelette for which one would almost have 
sold one’s country.) Blackbury, not to be outdone, 
had provided a sea-slug soup which he was convinced 
Des Roseaux could not match if he were fifty times 
a Frenchman, and ten times over a “born artist in 
gastronomy” — as Des Roseaux, when warmed with 
imported wines, would claim to be. 

They were not alone. Blackbury, some months 
before, had in a fit of boredom demanded a secre- 
tary from the Colonial Office authorities. He had 
as much use for a secretary as a frog has for 
feathers, but 'the Blackburys were well connected — 
what is better, usefully connected — so the Colonial 
Office, after asking only a few score questions and 
spending only a pound or two on printed forms, red 
tape and stamps, did what it knew it would do from 
the beginning, and despatched a clerk who had some 
sort of reason, apparently, for wanting to bury him- 
self before he was dead. And Blackbury, thence- 
forward, had someone to play cards with every 
evening, and a decent bowler to lob him easy prac- 
tice balls when he felt inclined to uphold British 
prestige in a good traditional way. 

Up on the peaky top of the island, there was 
wind, though there was none below. In Meliasi 
harbour, there are many peaked islands, and houses 
are built on the top of almost every one, for that 
very benefit of the winds, also because the trade 
guns used by local chiefs do not carry to a hundred 
feet or more in height. Blackbury’s official island 
was so near to the township on the mainland that he 


4 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


could hear and see what was going on in the Avenue j 
Napoleon (where the four little stores and the one ] 
great bar were situated) and yet the Residency was ) 
often several degrees cooler than the town. 

Tonight, the south-east trade, well established, i 
since it was July, and full mid-winter, crashed among] 
the palm-tree tops below the official verandah ; the ! 
surf, plainly to be seen in the flaring tropic moon- 
light at a distance of a mile or two away, sang aloud 
on the coral reef. It was cool — not more than sixty- 
nine or seventy, here on the top of the island — and 
it was somehow, with the crash of the wind, and the 
song of the beating seas, and the racing of the moon 
among wild clouds, inspiriting. A night when things 
might happen. A night when one would not be sorry 
if they did. 

Blackbury and Des Roseaux had finished the sea- 
slug soup — the Secretary refused it with one of his 
silent gestures — had fed upon viands cunningly 
disguised, upon salad and sweets, l^ad accepted cof- 
fee — such coffee as no one outside the plantation ji 
countries dreams of — from the hands of a Newr 
Cumberlandian dressed in a red rag and several! 
boar’s tusk’s bracelets — had strolled out to the 
verandah, and were leaning on the rail, smoking. 
Strong upon both, though they were old inhabitants 
of the islands, was the feeling of far-awayness, of 
having slipped across the utmost rim of the world, i 
that is known to most white dwellers of Melanesia. 
Stronger still was the instinct of silence, that hides ) 
the thought before it is uttered. j 

It was nearly ten o’clock, and Meliasi, this being 
no steamer night, had largely gone to bed. The 
Frenchman and the Englishman, looking down 
across the tops of the wind-thrashed, moonlit palms, 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


5 


and over the narrow strait, saw a street that seemed 
to be paved with snow, so white was its coral sand 
surface under the moon; roofs made of unpainted 
iron that took the same moon so vividly as to look 
like the typical snowy roofs of an English Christmas 
card; furry-black shadows under verandah posts; 
windows invisible, dark as blinded eyes. No lights, 
save in front of the bar entrance, now closed down 
to a narrow side door. No people walking the coral 
sand. Once in a way a dance of shadows across the 
bright oblong that the bar-room doorway threw 
upon the road; a Pierrot play of arms and heads 

and bottles Not quite all Meliasi was asleep, 

it seemed, this windy-silver night. 

Des Roseaux leaned his arms upon the rail, and 
sighed, partly because his France was very far away, 
and partly because the good wines liberally poured 
by Blackbury were getting in an after affect, and 
making him feel sad. He was a thin, bearded man 
with large eyes, and the look of one who carries a 
romantic story. He had none whatever, and could 
not have told anyone how, exactly, he had drifted 
to his present post in the New Cumberlands, or why 
he did not go away. Blackbury always startled 
strangers, and caused them to distrust, momentarily, 
the evidence of their own eyes, by his amazing re- 
semblance to Tenniel’s portraits of John Bull — a 
resemblance which he did his best to keep up by 
wearing narrow whiskers, longish curling hair, w^hite 
waistcoats, and coats of dark cotton; besides a 
white-toothed, genial smile that was as much a part 
of his daily attire as his collar or his boots. He was 
a hearty man. They would, in Tenniel’s day, have 
described him as being “of a full habit of body.” 
He roared like a bull when he laughed, ate like an 


6 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


ostrich, had a flat taste in jokes, and not the slightest 
appearance of romance, within or without. He 
knew quite well why he had come to the World’s 
End of the New Cum'berlands, fifteen years ago, and 
why he proposed to stay there ; she was most beauti- 
ful, and very highly placed, and you are not to be 
told the story, because it is not credible. 

Reginald Blackbury, having had his life, did not 
approve of ghosts who went back, when they were 
dead, and haunted the living. So he stayed in the 
New Cumberlands, and “watched” Great Britian’s 
interests. 

Like many bluff, stupid-seeming English of his 
type, he had keen instincts scarcely recognized by 
himself. It was he, the gross John Bull, and not the 
keen Latin by his side, who first noticed that some- 
thing unusual was afoot down in that quiet main 
street of Meliasi, where the bar-room shed its light 
upon the mimic coral snow. One could not see in, 
but One could see the shadow-play in the vivid glare 
cast by the naphtha lights, and things were un- 
doubtedly becoming livelier. 

Blackbury smoked quietly, and watched. Was 
not he watching his job? 

It was not an ordinary bar-room row; if it had 
been, it would scarcely have interested him. Riley’s, 
for years, had been the spring and origin of almost 
every fight in Meliasi. This was something different. 
Men seemed to be moving about excitedly, talking 
with waved hands and emphatic gestures ; snatching 
hats, at last, and cramming them on heads. A 
trader appeared at the door of the bar, forcing a 
bottle into his pocket; he had bread in his hands, he 
vas hurriedly stowing it away about his person. 

“Bread — provisions — at ten o’clock at night,” re- 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


7 


marked Blackbury’s subconscious self, taking notes. 
His other self, at the same time, cut the end off a 
cigar, lighted it, and listened, more or less, to what 
Des Roseaux was saying about the next steamer. It 
seemed that a rumor had drifted up, through the 
“wireless” of a man-of-war, to the effect that there 
was a lady passenger on board, someone bound to 
the Mission as a guest, but nobody knew if it was 
true. The Mission rather thought not; they had 
not had any intimation by the previous steamer. Des 
Roseaux, nevertheless, excited by the ‘possibility, had 
hypnotized himself into the belief that she certainly 
was coming and that she was young and very fair. 

“I feel it, I do not know how,” he explained. “I 
think she is going to come, she is going to -be beau- 
tiful, she will give some of us the occasion again to 
fall in love. . . .” 

Another trader appeared in Riley’s doorway, a 
stocky man who cast a short thick shadow. This 
man wasted no time, as the first had done, disposing 
packages and talking. He crammed his hat -on his 
head, and made a straight bolt for the street. He 
was followed by others; Riley’s seemed vomiting 
forth every customer. Up on the top of the hill, in 
the roar of the trade, one could of course hear noth- 
ing, but one could almost see the shouting and talk- 
ing. ... 

“Not a white woman in this cursed island under 
thirty-five, I swear you,” went on Des Roseaux. 
“And for looks — ^bah! But this one, she will be 
new from the winds and snows of the south, that 
make beauty as they make spring flowers ; she will — ” 

“By Gad!” cried Blackbury, interrupting without 
ceremony. “It’s Steve Conn again!’’ 

“Hurroo!” said the Frenchman, jumping up and 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


beginning what he imagined to be a jig. “Begora, 
my spalpeen, are*they there again, sure? Jabers me, 
but I will back the wild Irishman against all the other 
whillaloos. Hurroo!” He waved his arms above 
his head. 

Nobody noticed him. Blackbury was craning out 
to watch -the crowd below; the Secretary in the back- 
ground w^as looking at his chief with an air of 
inquiry. He was new to the Cumberlands. He did 
not, apparently, understand them, nor did the Cum- 
berlands, for the matter of that, understand him, 
save for a certain perception of social values that 
caused them to describe him, scornfully, as “one of 
the yaw-haws.” 

“Gad,” said Blackbury again, “it’s that right 
enough. Well, they haven’t had a Conn hunt for a 
year now. Wish them joy of it.” 

Des Roseaux evidently understood, for he uttered 
joyful little cries, and feigned to be a fox-hunter 
taking fences. “Tally-ho,” said the versatile Des 
Roseaux, quite unaffected by his audience’s neglect. 
“Tally-ho. Gone — gone off!” He hung over the 
verandah and waved. 

In the moonlight, over the coral snow, Riley’s 
customers went scuttering down the street. One or 
two had horses, those mounted galloped madly off. 
A man who was walking and running alternately 
stopped a wandering native, made him uncock the 
gun he carried over his shoulder (a common pre- 
liminary to any talk with New Cumberland canni- 
bals) and appeared to question him. The native 
pointed negligently, with the butt of his rifle, towards 
the forest that lay close-furred up the hills behind 
Meliasi. The white man nodded and ran on. He, 
too, had a lump of bread, and was stuffing it into his 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


9 

shirt as he ran. He had a tin as well; it lumped out 
big and square from the pocket on one hip. 

“Bet you a sovereign even, he wins again,’’ said 
Black'bury suddenly. 

“I won’t take it; not enough good,” was Des 
Roseaux’s reply. “I take you five to one.” 

“No fear,” answered the representative of 
Britain’s Majesty. “Some day, they’ll get'him, sure 
as eggs.” ^ 

“What is it about?” asked the Secretary, coming 
forward a step. He had evidently had a struggle 
with himself before giving way so far. 

“Conn,” replied Blackbury, putting back his cigar 
and speaking from one corner of his mouth. “Conn 
the Hundred Fighter.” 

“Really?” was the Secretary’s comment. You 
would have thought ‘he understood. 

Blackbury, of course, knew that he did not; that 
he was merely playing secretary. 

“There was ‘an Irish King,” he condescended to 
explain, “a couple of thousand years ago. That was 
what they called him. Conn thinks he’s descended 
from him.” 

“And is he?” 

“Well, you know, all Irish are descended from 
kings; you may have noticed it — ” 

“I think I have.” There might or might not have 
been a slight flavour of acid in the reply. 

“But perhaps Conn is a little more so than most. 
At any rate, he’s a damned useful sort with his fists, 
and some of the pearling crowd who have an O’ be- 
fore their names pinned the label on, just for fun. 
That was before they got to know about this hidden 
treasure business, but since then he’s fairly earned the 
name, for he’s fought all Meliasi about it, in a way. 


lO 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


and won, in a way. There’s nothing absolute about 
that sort of a win.” 

The Secretary waited till Blackbury had quite 
done, and then asked: 

“What is the hidden treasure business?” 

“Should have thought you knew — but you don’t 
seem much of a mixer, my*boy. Now, I — but about 
the treasure. I can’t tell you because I don’t know. 
Nobody knows. We all know Conn is simply roll- 
ing in riches, and gets them here, but that’s all.” 

“Here? In the New Cumberlands ?” 

“Here, on this very island of the New Cumber- 
lands, perhaps quite close to Meliasi. Nobody 
knows. He disappears sometimes for a while, and 
usually no one is aware of it till he’s back, but once 
in a way he’s missed, and then the whole town does 
as you see tonight, and gets on the hunt after him.” 

“But that,” said the Secretary, “is very remark- 
able.” 

“My friend,” observed the French Commissioner, 
“it is more than remarkable, it is a miracle. There 
is nothing that excites every passion of humanity 
as the thirst of gold; it makes the lazy one indus- 
trious, the stupid cunning, the coward it makes 
a brave man, and yet, bless my soul, with all the 
New Cumberlands unnaturally stimulated, until up 
to its very best to fight him, there is that Conn who 
v/ins !” 

The Secretary listened with his usual patience to 
the end, and then asked: “Is it gold, then?” 

“Flute ! What does*one know ? Something that’s 
worth gold. They say there is none in the New 
Cumberlands — ^but most of them are unexplored. 
Me, I think it is gold, but John Bull here, he’ll not 
have it.” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


II 


Blackbury, smiling all over his wide, whiskered 
face, shook his head. 

“No, my boy,” he said. “There’s too much mess 
about gold. You can’t hide the workings.” 

“In the mountains, unexplored, why not?” 

“Maybe — if they weren’t unexplored. But they 
are, and likely to ‘Stop so, until there’s law to disarm 
these beggars of natives. I don’t believe Conn gets 
away in there. They’d eat him.” 

“Perhaps,” suggested the Secretary, a spark show- 
ing in his eyes — they were dark, uncommon eyes with 
a boring strength behind them, ill suited to his white, 
inexpressive face — “Perhaps this Mr. Conn has an 
unusual influence over the natives. Such things have 
been known.” 

“By Gad, they have,” agreed Blackbury mus- 
ingly. “Pendragon — not so many years ago, with 
his crew of fighting cannibals — if anyone ever was 
King of the Cumberlands, it was he, till they got 
him and tied him to his mast, and cut him up alive, 
to feed the fishes. And there was a woman once — 
dead now — she was an ex-convict, who’d some 
grudge against the world; a Frenchwoman — ” 

“I remember,” from Des Roseaux. “It was the 
year before I came; she died of fever, nothing more. 
She was the veritable queen of Aolani; half a life- 
time. An island, I give you my word, where the 
man-of-war crews scarcely dare arrive today. Of 
other people, no one. But she was their queen. Yes, 
these islands of the West have such histories.” 

The Secretary listened, motionless. 

“But about Conn,” burst in the British Commis- 
sioner’s rich voice — a voice to match his person, and 
the good English port stored in his hurricane cellar 
— “he’s something more than king of a pack of na- 


12 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


tives, because he’s rich, where all of us are damned 
poor. Conn runs my islands for me, more or less, 
the dashed — ” 

Des Roseaux patted Blackbury’s sleeve gently. 

“My islands, John Bull, if you please; the islands 
of my country.” 

Blackbury laughed. The two were excellent 
friends, especially when they disagreed. 

“Our islands. Rosy, if you like. Well, Conn runs 
them. Deny it if you can.” 

“He has not,” said the Frenchman scornfully, 
“any intellectual influence. And where it is a ques- 
tion of France, and the sons of France, the intel- 
lect — ” 

“I believe the beggar has a T. C. D. degree,” 
allowed Blackbury. 

“Really,” was the Secretary’s remark. 

“Don’t be a scornful little dog,” warned Black- 
bury humorously. “You are only ‘Londiniensis’ 
yourself, and one’s as good as another.” 

“You have a degree of Oxford,” said the French- 
man. He had none himself, but he was prepared to 
uphold the prestige of all Commissioners in front 
of all secretaries at any time. 

“Would have had, if I hadn’t got sent down for 
a row about a girl three weeks too soon,” corrected 
the Briton. “What does it all matter to dead men?” 

No one seemed able to answer. The Frenchman 
politely choked back a yawn. It was getting slow. 
Riley’s was shut for the night. Down in the street 
below, the Conn hunters had disappeared. The 
moon, not yet at full, was climbing down the sky. 
If one did not wish to get back to one’s island in 
the dark. 

The Commissioner who “watched” for France 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


13 

rose to his feet, bowed from his waist, and took 
formal leave. 

“That pearlers’ island, they are very drunk this 
two days and nights,” he explained. “Hopkins and 
Fursey I have seen down in the street, who went 
off on the Conn hunt. Sometimes when they have 
drunk, I have known them who fired at me from 
their beach as I went in my whaleboat. It is best I 
should get back before they find that Mr. Conn is 
not to be found, and return.” 

“Fursey is the worst,” stated Blackbury. “I’ve 
half a mind to set the man-of-war on him when she 
comes along again — ^though God knows when that 
will be.” 

“He’s the pearler who made that trouble about 
the three native girls, isn’t he, sir?” asked the Sec- 
retary. 

“Yes. He’ll have us all in the cooking pots one 
of these days, with his dashed nonsense. It doesn’t 
pay to meddle with the New Cumberland women; 
nothing so likely to raise a general insurrection. 
And Fursey is a poisonous nuisance with women, 
black, white and tan. You remember Guilbert’s 
wife, and the scandal over the nurse who came up 
for the round trip on the boat? And — well, I don’t 
know how it is that none of you duelling fire-eaters 
of French have never shot him, yet.” 

“It would be a good work,” agreed Des Roseaux, 
with calmness. “But in the meantime, I must hurry 
myself, to get myself home before he is back. Good- 
night, Your Excellency. I thank you for a most 
agreeable evening. No, do not take .the trouble — ” 
to the Secretary, who was silently seeing him out. 
“If you will — well, good-night, Mr. — I am sorry, 
I forget your name again.” 


14 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“Gatehouse,” supplied the young man. He was 
already familiar with the notorious “New Cumber- 
land memory.” 

“I am sorry, never can I think of anything but 
Lodge. It is my fault. Good-night, Mr. Gate- 
house, take good care of His Excellency for me.” 

“He and you are not really Excellencies, are 
you?” demanded Gatehouse. The point seemed to 
interest him. 

Des Roseaux made an inexpressible gesture with 
his fine French hands. 

“We are bluff, dear Mr. Gatehouse — bluff, both 
two. We name ourselves Excellent, if we like. It 
is only another bluff. Yet, nevertheless, no one can 
call our bluff for us — that is as the Americans say. 
Behind, there is our mans-of-war, and they are not 
bluff. No, we are more kings than it would seem.” 

“Good-night,” bowed Gatehouse, on the steps. 
His eyes were bright. They dulled as he went back 
to the verandah, where Blackbury, looking more like 
John Bull than ever, so that^one really missed the 
top-boots, was already shuffling a pack of cards for 
his nightly game. 

Some two hours later, the Commissioner, having 
won a rubber of whist and taken a lesson, besides, 
in the new game of “bridge” that Gatehouse had 
brought out with him from Home, poured himself 
a final whisky, and began thinking of bed. The Sec- 
retary had gone off as soon as released. It was late 
now; the moon was down, the wind had fallen, and 
the waters of Meliasi’s matchless harbour, island- 
strewn, were like a shield of grey steel set with dark 
bosses of marble and moss-agate. The breath of 
the night, filled as all midnight airs are filled, with 
things mysterious, dark hopes ; fragments and sparks 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


15 


of dreams that belong, in their entirety, to no one 
soul, but to the souls of all the present and the past; 
the call that most men hear, and many follow, and 
no man understands, crept upwards from the bush. 
What breeze there was, was land-breeze now; it is 
so, when the small hours dawn. 

Blackbury, slowly drinking his whisky, and look- 
ing out at nowhere with his John Bull face, may 
have heard these things, or only felt them, or per- 
haps not even felt them. With the John Bulls, one 
does not know. 

There came a sound at the verandah entrance. 
The Commissioner’s face was unmoved as he turned 
his head to listen, but there was nothing slow about 
the way he reached for the sawed-off shotgun that 
stood in a corner near his chair, and slung it to his 
shoulder. In the New Cumberlands, you never can 
tell. ... 

With the gun ready, and his half-finished glass at 
his elbow, he listened a moment longer. The sound 
of a shod heel — rubber shod — came to his ear. He 
lowered the gun, replaced it, and took up his glass 
again. Through the bottom of it, as he finished, he 
saw a white man advancing towards his chair. He 
nodded, and drank the last mouthful. 

“Well,” he said, setting down the glass, “you’re 
a nice kind of young man to come calling here in the 
middle of the night, I don’t think, — after setting 
the town by the ears. Do you know all Meliasi, and 
Dan Fursey, are out hunting you?” 

The caller, without making any reply, came for- 
ward to a tray-laden table that stood at the Com- 
missioner’s elbow, poured himself a drink, and threw 
it down his throat. Blackbury looked at him through 
narrowed eyelids. He was yellow, as white men 


1 6 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


In the tropics are when they turn pale, and there 
were marks beneath his eyes. His clothes were ex- 
tremely dirty, and his shoes cut about. It did not 
take much to see that he had been having a strenuous 
time, somehow, somewhere or other, and that not 
long ago. The man was tall, and looked taller; he 
might have been thirty to thirty-five. He had fair 
dry hair, sticking up about the parting; a shaven 
face that had not been shaved for two days ; grey, 
rather insolent eyes as hard as glass. You felt, 
looking at him, that he did not care a little curse 
what you thought of him. You liked him for it, 
rather. When you had been taking stock of him for 
some time, you discovered that he was good looking, 
and then you forgot it again, because that seemed a 
little thing. When he went away, things seemed to 
slacken down, one stretched one’s feet, and yawned, 
with a sense of ease, that was somehow, at the same 
time, a sense of emptiness. His name was Stephen 
Conn. 

Blackbury seemed to know his visitor. He waited 
till Conn had swallowed a temperate drink, and 
then handed him a plate of sandwiches. Conn ate 
a few, quietly and not in any hurry. The Commis- 
sioner waited for him to speak, which he did pres- 
ently, wiping his fingers on a napkin, and not look- 
ing up. 

“I’d as soon you could get Fursey deported on 
some pretext or other.” 

“May one ask why?” 

“Certainly. He has shot at me once or twice 
too often, and you know I don’t like killing people.” 

“I know It’s not one of your habits, as Denys In 
‘The Cloister and the Hearth,’ said about mar- 
riage. W^hy does the excellent Fursey try to kill 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


17 


the gander that has the golden eggs, and won’t tell 
where they are? It’d seem to be foolish of Fursey.” 

“He is foolish. He thinks I’ve got the natives 
terrorized, and that if I were out of the way, he 
could make them talk.” Conn looked up now. 
There was something good in that glass-hard glance 
of his. Blackbury thought, as he had often thought 
before — “The chap is no liar.” 

“Well,” he said aloud, “I’ll see if I can’t stick 
him with some of his crimes by the time we have 
the next man-of-war. They could take him down 
to jail in Fiji. I can swear he’s a danger to British 
interests here, with his ‘dashed inconsiderate ways 
about the native women. That’ll make them sit up.” 

“Thanks,” said Conn, rising to his feet. 

“Off home?” 

“Yes, I had” — with a little break of laughter 
that lit up the hard face into sudden boyishness, — 
“I had a run for it.” 

“What, they nearly caught you?” 

“Oh, no. They don’t do that. But I had a mind 
to let them go off on a wild-goose chase, and so I 
had to show myself, and double. They’re half across 
the island by now. Fursey,” he added inconse- 
quently, “Fursey is a rotten bad shot, for one of the 
pearling crowd.” 

“Did he—?” 

“Twice.” 

“Oh, you know, that’s too bad altogether. I don’t 
mind rows among the pearlers’ island crew, but when 
they get to potting my friends — he’ll get his medi- 
cine, and as soon as possible. I’ll try and stick him 
with something. I wish they would get ahead with 
this wireless business they keep talking so much of. 
Handy in places like Meliasi. You pass Fursey’s 


i8 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


island on your way? Well, theyVe all off tonight. 
Des Roseaux has been annoyed by them lately, he 
says. They pick up that habit of miscellaneous 
potting from the natives — and a good deal more. 
I’d like to get the Admiralty to buy Punnett for a 
gun target, as they bought Five Stick. Night-night. 
I ought to have won a pound on you this time, but 
Des Roseaux said — oh, he’s gone, uncivil beggar. 
. . . Time for bed, Reginald, my boy. Reg, you’re 
gettin’ old.” 


CHAPTER II 


D EIRDRE rose, in the dying years of the 
nineteenth century, lived a life of dreams. 

It is not possible, now-a-days, for a girl to live 
in dreams. The age of machinery, heralded nearly 
a century ago, has finally come into its own within 
the last score of years, and the girl of today has 
been swept into a whirlpool of mechanical activities 
and interests unthought of by her mother, and in- 
compatible with the dreaming habit of mind. If 
you dream when steering a car through thick traffic, 
you will wake to a reality of murder or suicide. 

If you fall into a trance of becoming dismay when 
the motor-bike you bestride gets stringhalt in its 
carburetor, you will be left by the roadside to spend 
the night. The war-girl, handling high explosives 
through long years, learned, if never before, to nip 
the dreaming habit before it had time to bud; she 
might have dreamed a factory full of workers into 
red gobbets for the crows. . . . 

But there were no motors, nor was there war or 
thought of war in all the world, when Victoria was 
queen, and Deirdre Rose, a girl. Nor was there any 
hurry. There was always time for everything, and 
summers, even in Northern Ireland, were ages and 
ages long. 

When you lived in a large brick and stone square 
building set on a green terrace, somewhere up a 
19 


20 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


mountainside away from towns, and your father 
was dead, and your stepmother possessed by a pas- 
sion for making calls in a slow stately landau (who 
has seen landaus in these days?) and your stepsister 
was always willing to go with her, so that you were 
left much, much and happily, alone — how would 
you keep from dreaming? Above all when you were 
what all girls fancy themselves, and what Deirdre 
Rose truly was — “not like others.” 

She was pretty to begin with. She had what 
matters most, the perfect mouth — smallish, short in 
the upper lip, and very red; it tilted upward like the 
mouth of a Bacchante or a faun, and looked as if it 
smiled, even when Deirdre was not smiling. She 
had the egg-shaped cheek of beauty, the running 
“streamline” of neck and shoulder that is like a 
strain of music, the look of mistiness and colour 
about the hair, the out-watching starriness of eyes, 
that are the letters from which the great word 
“beauty” may be spelled. 

She had a figure that was slight where it should 
be slight, and rounded where girlish roundnesses 
should be. She was limbed like a young cat (than 
which there is nothing more graceful) and her foot, 
like the typical foot of her generation, was small. 
Deirdre had all the prettinesses. Yet — 

Mabel, her stepsister, twenty-three, where 
Deirdre was but twenty; short-waisted, with a pulpy 
mouth and a high colour — Mabel had admirers, two 
or three of them. Deirdre had not any. When 
they went to dances together, Mabel filled her pro- 
gramme speedily, and Deirdre sat as often as she 
danced. Deirdre did not mind. She was a dreamer. 
And the men of Northern Ireland were not her 
dream. They were hard, they talked of business. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


21 


they had accents with sharp corners and inflexions. 
Mabel, who was in love with a Belfast spinner, aged 
twenty-nine, and as hard-surfaced as his own steel 
spindles, told Deirdre that the north was dark and 
true — she could not honestly say tender — and 
Deirdre, the girl who was different, looked out of 
the window towards the sea that glimmered five 
miles off, beyond the spiring chimneys of Belfast, 
and finished the line— 

^Bright and fierce and fickle is the south* — Give 
me the south, Mab, I don’t like dark things.” 

“Henry’s hair is fair,” objected Mab. 

“It’s red. No matter, I meant the inside of 
Henry, not the outside.” 

“What do you want, then, dear?” 

“Chocolates,” answered Deirdre, producing a 
box. It was her way of changing the conversation. 
Could she say to Mab — Mab, the girl whose world 
lay inside a wedding veil, and a ring — what she 
wanted, she who was different? Could she tell her 
how words, lines, names in geography books, even, 
hypnotized her, and repeated again and again the 
call that, she was sure as death, she must answer one 
of these days? 

Foolish little spells they were, to raise up spirits 
so strong. They had begun their work in the school- 
room. Lines in 'Smith’s Grammar, in Cornwell’s 
Geography — absurd ! 

*‘He looked thoughtfully towards the glimmering 
sea-line,** When she read that example, it was not 
an example to her. It was a window, suddenly 
opened, and looking out miles and thousands of 
miles away. It made her tremble. . . . 

The names of the Irish mountain ranges, strung 
in a row to be learnt off by heart, were full of a 


22 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


mystic wonder, a beauty that she could not have 
explained or told. “The Mourne, the Slieve Bloom, 
the Galtees, the Blackstairs, the Knockmealdown” 
— they sounded like bells rung at evening to her. 
And yet it was not they that she desired. It was 
something that they meant. 

How could one tell such things to a stepsister 
Mabel, who giggled about young men and atten- 
tions ? Deirdre knew, knew fiercely, that she would 
never care about young men. They stood in the 
way of everything. . . . 

The widow, her stepmother, was a Victorian in 
every sense of the word; she believed in having a 
girl taught by suitable governesses, made to say her 
prayers and sit straight in her chair, confirmed 
at the right time, in the right dress, and 
taken out to dances at the right age. The rest 
was on the knees of the gods — if Mrs. Rose ever 
thought of using such an expression, which she 
never did, knees being hardly delicate, in Victoria’s 
day. 

The daughter of Mrs. Rose’s half English, half 
South Ireland husband was as much a mystery to 
her as dead Dennis Rose himself had been. Wiser 
than she knew she was, she let Deirdre alone. And 
Deirdre dreamed. . . . 

I like to think of her in the leisurely days of that 
nineteenth century end, that was the end of all 
leisure, riding the Antrim roads among the rust-red 
and lilac hills, on her quiet “aged” brown horse — 
her dress, a long green “habit” with tight buttoned 
shell-jacket, green trousers peeping out modestly, 
when she cantered, over little polished boots, in her 
gloved hand a gold and amber whip. I like to think 
of that time, of the lull before the storm, of the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


23 

quiet dawn that ushered in a noon of happenings 
strange, wild, terrible. . . . 

Deirdre, with beauty in her face that the North 
Antrim mill-owner could neither understand nor de- 
sire — Deidre, with the hot heart and roaming foot 
of the world’s eternal gypsy breed — Deidre, cursed 
or blessed — who knows? — ^with the terrible gift of 
“unlikeness” — Deirdre, the wanderer, the fated, rid- 
ing softly among still home lanes in Maytime, 
dreams in her eyes, and peace that was to last so 
little time upon her untouched, girlish lips — when 
I see her thus, I think that I am listening in an old, 
Venetianed, .rose-bowl-scented drawing room, to one 
of those Mendelssohn “Lieder” long since out of 
fashion; to its cold brightness, its plaintive melody, 
its gentle sunset sadness. They always seemed, those 
old Lieder, to be softly regretting something; telling 
some story of lost peace. 

The break came, as it comes in different guise, 
to all. It came to Mabel first, as a wedding in 
St. Anne’s, and a white satin dress, and a wreath 
and veil, and bridesmaids and a honeymoon and a 
villa in Balmoral — and a husband. Deirdre grew 
restless, what her stepmother called troublesome, 
after Mabel was gone. Mrs. Rose thought and 
said that she was jealous of Mabel’s settlement 
in life. 

“Good God,” said Deirdre, standing very straight 
and slim before the window away from the fire (it 
was a wild March day, a day calling to the blood 
of youth) “you talk of settlement in life — I want no 
settlement anywhere till I find one under ground. 
Let me go, mamma. Let me see the world.” 

“You talk as if you were a man,” said the step- 
mother, with cold eyes. 


24 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“Why not?” said Deirdre fiercely. “What is 
there a man can do that I can’t?” 

“Oh, I know you learned all sorts of Latin and 
counterpoint and things, my dear; I ought to know, 
since I paid — ^but that isn’t all. A girl can’t be like 
a man. She must be taken care of. She can’t take 
care of herself.” 

“I can.” 

“No, dear, not unless you were a married woman 
or a widow. A girl can’t go rambling about alone.” 

“A married woman can?” 

“Certainly. But you don’t seem like marrying.” 

“It is the last thing on earth — ” began Deirdre. 

No woman can live through a lifetime that in- 
cludes marriage, motherhood, and widowhood, and 
remain altogether a fool. Mrs. Rose was not so 
simple as you or I might have ^bought; not quite 
so narrow as she looked. She*^ threw a glance at 
Deirdre’s flushed, undoubtedly fair face, and it 
struck her, for the first time, but with force, that 
Deirdre was as sure to know love as a flower is sure, 
in time, to feel, and open to the sun. 

“Don’t talk nonsense, dear,” was all she said 
placidly. But a certain uneasiness about this wild 
bird of a stepdaughter — this handsome creature who 
did not love, and was not loved, and wanted to go 
roaming the wide world all alone — preposterous ! — 
urged her to “do something.” The something took 
the form of a long visit to an aunt In Dublin; of 
study, there, for a degree. What good the letters 
“B. A.” after her name would do the girl, if any, 
she could not conceive, but Deirdre took to the plan, 
and it would keep her, the stepmother reflected, out 
of mischief. 

“Dennis knew his own blood,” she thought, “when 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


25 


he made that will. There is no need for her to 
know anything about it. But even if she did, she 
could do nothing.” 

For Rose, when dying, fourteen years before, had 
left all the small sum he owned (the bulk of income 
being his second wife’s) to Deirdre, child of •his first, 
best love. But with a certain strain of caution that 
few people had expected of him, he placed 'the 
money in the hands of two trustees, one his wife, 
the other a lawyer, until Deirdre should marry, or 
reach the age of six and twenty. 

“She can’t touch it for another five years,” thought 
Mrs. Rose, and felt vaguely comforted. She was not 
the grasping stepmother of fiction; Deirdre’s small 
hoard had increased rather than diminished in her 
care — but she was vaguely uneasy as to what the 
girl might do with it. . . . 

In four months’ time, Deirdre, who “knew noth- 
ing” about the money, wrote from Dublin to say 
that she was married, asked for her fortune of 
seven thousand odd to be paid in full, and signed 
herself, amazingly, “Deirdre Rose.” 

Mrs. Rose took the first train to Dublin, arrived 
horrified, indignant and reproachful. The aunt, de- 
scended upon first, declared she knew nothing, and 
did not think it could be true. Deirdre had been 
going in and out to her classes just as usual ; was at 
that moment in lecture; would be home to* lunch. 
. . . Confronted with the letter, she opined it 
must be a hoax, or a silly attempt to get hold of the 
money. Why had the girl signed herself Rose? 

The stepmother, fortified by cake and wine, con- 
sented to believe the best. It had, she confessed, 
given her a terrible shock — she had not known what 
to think. 


26 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“Whatever nonsense she may or may not have 
been up to,” said the aunt, “I can tell you, Deirdre 
is a perfectly good girl.” 

“Of course,” said Mrs. Rose, who did not think 
it of course at all — otherwise she had not needed 
that Genoa cake and invalid port to brighten up 
the outlook. 

Deirdre, at lunch time, arrived dressed in a tailor 
made, not new, and an everyday hat, and carrying 
a strap of notebooks. Anything less like a runaway 
bride, no one, surely, had ever seen. 

“Deirdre,” demanded the stepmother, panting, as 
she felt she 'Ought, “what have you done? What do 
you MEAN?” 

Deirdre unstrapped her notebooks, took off her 
hat, and tidied her hair at the chimney glass. 

“I told you. I’m married,” she said, smooth- 
ing down a curl of her fringe. “I can do exactly 
as I like now. I mean to take my degree — the 
exam’s in three weeks — and then realize my money, 
and—” 

“Good gracious, heavens, girl,” demanded the 
maddened lady, who stood for Propriety and the 
World, “who have you married — who has dared 
to — ” 

“You ought to say whom, mamma. I married 
Mr. Rogers on Monday afternoon, at the North 
Circular Road Registry office.” 

“You dare to stand up and tell me — ^where is 
he?” 

“I don’t know. He ought to be in lecture in an- 
other ten minutes, but we’re not in the same year, you 
know — he’s going up for his M. A. If you want 
to see him, you could catch him coming out of the 
Latin. Or you could find him in the Gaiety tonight 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


27 


— he said something on Monday about having tickets 
for Wednesday, with friends.” 

“In the name of goodness, you unlucky child, what 
is the man’s address?” 

“Don’t go goodnessing about, mamma, there’s 
no need. I’ll get you the address if you really want 
it. I don’t know it myself. I never went to tea 
with any of the students, it’s not my form.” 

“Deirdre, are you married to this man, or is it 
all a wicked joke?” 

“I wish you wouldn’t go calling him ‘this man,’ 
mamma, it sounds so stagey, and so impolite too. 
There% no ‘this man’ about the case at all. Mr. 
Rogers has been the very kindest, most chivalrous 
gentleman I ever imagined — I never thought any 
man could be such a perfect knight. He is a revo- 
lutionary — ” 

“Deirdre !” 

“They are quite respectable, mamma; they only 
want freedom and the brotherhood of man, and 
they think a woman has the right to lead her own 
life, only social conventions beat her down, and Mr. 
Rogers was reading the life of Sonia Kovalevsky, 
and so was I — ” 

“Who?” 

“Sonia Kovalevsky. The greatest woman mathe- 
matician the world ever knew. And her people kept 
her down, and gave her no freedom, so she made 
a student marriage, and became free. So I told Mr. 
Rogers how I loved the book, and I told him about 
my money — ail those records are in the Registrar 
General’s place, you know; one 'can see wills — and 
I said how I was kept down and had no freedom, and 
how I knew I was not like other women, and would 
never, never love. And what do you think he said?” 


28 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“I can guess — when you mentioned the seven 
thousand.” 

“No, you can’t, mamma, for he said he would be 
married like Sonia Kovalesky, a student marriage, 
and 'that he’d execute a deed of settlement of every 
penny on me, the minute the marriage was done. 
And he brought it in his pocket, and it was signed 
and witnessed, and he gave it to me and bowed — 
so chivalrously, and raised my hand to — that is, he 
bowed, and went away.” 

“Went away?” 

“Of course. That’s a student marriage. But I 
can easily look him up some time today, and tell 
him you want to see him. Only don’t row him, 
mamma, for he’s been most obliging.” 

Deirdre turned to the glass again, drew a hairpin 
out, put it back, looked at her fingers, somewhat 
ink-stained, and asking, “Where is the pumice 
stone?” left the room. 

The two older women, planted opposite each 
other on the sofa, stared for a moment, and then 
exclaimed, almost together: 

“Good Lord, Blanche !” 

“Did you ever, Clara?” 

There was silence — a pregnant silence — for some 
seconds after. 

It was broken by Mrs. Rose, who burst into tears. 

“I don’t blame you, Clara,” she sobbed, “I know 
what Deirdre is — no one could ever manage her — 
but this is a terrible, terrible thing.” 

“The man,” said Aunt Clara, “seems to have be- 
haved better than anyone could have expected.” 

“Oh, that’s all very well, but what are we to look 
for? ^ She’s legally married to him, and he can’t 
be quite such a fool as he seems to be. Mark my 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


29 


words, Clara, we’ll hear more of it before long. 
He’s only biding his time. If there was a man in 
the family to deal with the fellow — ” 

“We can get Mr. Canning.” Canning was the 
co-trustee. 

“Yes. But it wants a young man — to deal with 
him—” 

“If you mean fight him, Blanche, I don’t agree 
with you. He seems to be simply a hot-headed 
young ass who thinks himself a Red Republican as 
somebody says we all do at twenty-five — ” 

“I never did.” 

“I don’t suppose so. But most men do. This 
Rogers is one of your romantics, damsel in distress, 
and all that, mixed up with red ties and socialism, 
of a harmless kind. We’ve only got to put it to 
him properly — with the lawyer to help — and he’ll 
see the boot is quite on* the other leg, and that the 
most chivalrous thing he can do is to get out of it, 
and enable her to get out. It could be done, you 
know. Fie could desert her, and refuse maintenance, 
or something of that kind. And after two years — 
Sh, there she is.” 

Deirdre came back into the drawing room, hands 
washed, books put away. 

“Isn’t there any lunch but cake?” she asked. 

“I suppose Jane has laid it ’by now. Will you 
come in, Blanche?” 

“I’m 'horribly hungry,” said Deirdre, leading the 
way. 

“Do you suppose,” asked her stepmother trag- 
ically, in the dark of the passage leading from down- 
stairs sitting room to dining room, “that that man 
is going to leave you alone, you misguided^ girl?” 

“Oh, yes, mamma. I don’t take any interest in 


30 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


him at all, except that I am grateful to him. And 
he really doesn’t want to be bothered with me.” 
Deirdre opened the dining-room door. 

“Do you think,” said her stepmother, pausing on 
the threshold, “do you really think, poor child, that 
you aren’t going to see him again?” 

“Of course I do,” answered Deirdre. “Except 
coming out of lecture.” She broke off the conversa- 
tion, of which she seemed to have had enough, and 
began hurriedly carving the lunch. 

Deirdre was right. As things drew out in the 
long run, she was even more right than she expected 
to*be. For Mr. Rogers did not come to two o’clock 
Latin lecture or to any other, and from that day, 
the girl he had married did not see him again. 

Her aunt and her stepmother made inquiries. 
They learned from the college books that Rogers 
had been an independent student; paid his own fees, 
the son of an English gentleman, deceased. Irreg- 
ular in attendance, but a good student on the whole. 
Only address, 940, Lower Mount Street — an apart- 
ment house. They called and heard that Mr. Rogers 
was away. 


So Deirdre, ill-fated, tied about her neck with 
careless hands the slip-knotted noose that is mar- 
riage. But instead of the end carried in the hand 
of one, it was with her the end left loose to all the 
winds of Heaven,^ trailing where strange fingers 
might snatch, or idle foot might tread. 

She did not know. She was not, for years, to know 
how far the noose might lead her; how sharp its 
drag might be. 


CHAPTER III 


TT was Tahiti, and It was afternoon. 

It Is always afternoon In Tahiti, even at seven 
o’clock in the morning. Under the dreaming peaks 
of Orohena, with the long light growing among the 
palms, and the reef, a harp to the waking fingers of 
the “trade,” beginning once more its age-old song, 
one can scarce believe that seven of the morning 
is the same seven that, in far cities: 


“Casts a sullen glance 
Rousing each caitiff to his task of care, 
Of sinful man the sad inheritance.” 


The adr of afternoon — summer afternoon, eternal 
summer — lies always warm upon the islands, above 
all on Tahiti. But when the light is really on the 
wane, and the reef-birds begin their crying, and the 
royal domes of the mangoes, most glorious of tropic 
trees, grow gold-green, dusk-green, dark, then the 
spirit of all the afternoons the world has ever known, 
— their languor, their pathos, their drugged and 
honeyed sorrow falls on Tahiti and claims it for 
Its own. . . . 

They were playing something, in the half-dark 
drawing room of the Papeete hotel — something that 
suited, strangely, the place and hour. It was as if 
the island, ready for sleep, was singing to itself as 
31 


32 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


it drowsed away into dreams. One did not know 
who was playing, nor did one think. It was the 
sunset that made the music — the trade-wind, dying 
among the palms — the ripple of the tideless, green 
lagoon not fifty yards away. . . . 

The music paused, changed, and glided into a 
song. Someone was singing. This was not the 
sunset or the palms; it was a woman. She had a 
shadowy voice, not strong, but full of charm. She 
sang, softly, a little gypsy road-song, that left your 
heart aching, you did not know why. The voice 
paused, on a broken note, and ended. 

“Jove!” said someone on the verandah. It was 
near dinner time; the people from the steamer were 
waiting for their food. 

“Hush,” whispered an officious voice, “don’t say 
anything, she’ll stop if you do.” 

“Who is i)t?” in a hissing whisper. 

“Herself — Deirdre. Oh, do be quiet — she’s going 
to begin again.” 

The voice recommenced. This time it was a sea- 
song, the song of a sailor’s love. You know it; > 
since those days, it has been sung to death in every j 
drawing room. But then it was new, and the J 
steamer folk, waiting for their dinner, had never ■ 
heard it. They clapped, at the end, loudly. ; 

“Now you’ve done it,” whispered the officious ■ 
lady. “She’ll stop. Probably she thought she was (i 
alone.” ^ ^ ^ 

“Jove,’’ said the man, “it was good. I’ll get that; 
do you think it’s out?” 

Nobody listened to him. They were absorbed in 
staring at the little lady — not so very little either, 
but her graceful slimness made her look small — who 
had just come from the inner room. Not much more 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


33 


than a girl, they judged her, some thirty years of 
age at most, pretty, distinguished looking, some- 
what wistfully sad. But that, of course, was ac- 
counted for by the mourning she wore. Her dress 
was not white like all the other dresses on the hotel 
verandah. It was black, a black delicately thin, and 
full of suggestions of soft white laces and ruffles 
underneath — but black for all that. She wore stock- 
ings of white silk — ‘in mosquito countries, the black 
stocking is a trap for trouble — and very small black 
silk shoes with a sparkling dewdrop of paste on 
each. Her dusky hair was piled high on her head, 
and snooded round with a silver ribbon. She wore 
a silver chain about her neck, no other jewellery, save 
a plain gold ring on the flower-like left hand that 
hung, white and drooping, against the black of her 
dress. 

When she saw the crowd on the verandah, she 
turned a little aside, slipped through a pair of bead 
curtains that concealed an inconspicuous doorway, 
and vanished. 

Out burst the flood of talk. The whispering lady 
belonged to the town; she knew everybody and 
everything in Papeete — and more. To her the new- 
comers turned. Was that the wonderful little song- 
writer who had cut out Laurence Hope and her 
school ? The woman who had written and composed 
“Your Shadow On My Heart,” “Gypsy Lover,” 
“My Love Has Wedded the Sea-Wind,” “Home, 
Home to You,” and a score of other wander-songs 
and wanderer love-songs, haunting, fascinating, 
poignantly sweet and sad? You could not help hum- 
ming “Deirdre’s” songs over and over to yourself, 
once you had heard them. You could not rest till you 
had sung them to him, or her. The world was lis- 


34 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

tening to “Deirdre’s” music; making love in her 
words. 

This was certainly “Delrdre,” the whispering lady 
assured the steamer folk. Her real name was noth- 
ing very pretty, Mrs. Rogers, and she was a widow, 
and she travelled about everywhere, all over the 
world. It was said; she never stayed long anywhere. 
She was In the islands for a little while now. She 
would not talk very much to anyone; she seemed a 
trifle unsociable; she had a few acquaintances or 
friends here and there, and kept to them. They 
might hear her again, very likely would. . . . 
Yes, it was not much of a voice, but so very sweet — 
and 4hen those songs were not meant to be sung 
loud; that was the great charm of them — ^any voice 
could sing them. It was said “Deirdre’’ was making 
money out of them, but composers never grew rich. 
She did not dress like a wealthy woman. Good 
taste? Oh, yes, but one always knew. . . . 
Widow? Yes, not very recently either, so it seemed. 
Probably she had some kind of a history; Indeed, 
people did say she had been divorced or something. 
She must have had heaps of love affairs — look at 
her face, and the very way she walked across a room 
— that always told you — and then the songs, they 
were quite suitable songs, you know, nothing not 
fitted for a drawing room, hut they were very pas- 
sionate — wonderful! You felt, when you heard 
them, that you must be In love with somebody, 
whether you were or not. Remarkable gift. Re- 
markable woman — and hardly more than a girl. . . . 

In her own bedroom, which was cool at this eve- 
ning hour, and cloyingly sweet, with the scent of 
the tiere trees outside, the “remarkable woman” sat 
on her bed, and looked out at the last rays of the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


35 


sunset dying over the reef. There was a pile of her 
own songs on a table; a sheaf of press cuttings be- 
side them. Photographs of singers, autographed, 
hung about the room; they had been sent to her from 
all over Europe and America. She was famous in 
her way; pointed out everywhere she went as 
“Deirdre,” the new young composer; the writer of 
songs and words that had touched the hearts of 
lovers all the world through. Deirdre, once Deirdre 
Rose, had had her wish of wandering, full measure, 
pressed down, and running over. She had found 
herself in her wanderings, and found her work. It 
was to write the love-songs of the world — ^^she who 
had not, and never must have, love. 

Deirdre was eight and twenty. She had had seven 
years, since that mad day of the “student marriage,” 
to learn exactly what it was that she had done, when 
she lightheartedly tied a noose about her neck for 
freedom’s sake. She had seen the world, read the 
great book of men and women, and found it very 
different from the ‘books .of ink and paper, on which 
her young girlhood had been fed. In books there 
was “one love, one life” for everyone, no more; 
sometimes, indeed, there was less — one remembered 
the charming men of fiction, who had never even 
thought of any woman until, at forty or thereabouts, 
they met the heroine; the fascinating woman who 
one felt quite sure would have gone through life 
loved, but never won, if they had not, about the 
second chapter, just chanced to come across the 
hero. . . . Eliminate that chance, and you had 
the touching picture of a lovable, loving-hearted 
man or woman who managed to get through life 
without ever loving, in the great sense, anyone 
at all 


36 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

In fiction, it always worked. In life, Deirdre had 
learned and learned again, it did not. 

There was always the man for the woman, always 
the woman for the man — and all the time. That 
was where fiction parted from life and went, shriek- 
ing, down the ways of time alone. The hero did not 
wait for the heroine to fall in love. He fell in love 
continuously; sometimes he managed to clear the 
stage for the heroine, and sometimes he did not. 
The heroine. . . . 

What -had Deirdre, once Deirdre Rose, learned 
about her during those seven years? 

She had learned that a woman, barred from love, 
is barred from life. She had learned that the world 
and all that therein is, cannot weigh down the scales 
for -a moment, against a feather from Love’s wings. 
She had learned that many women were placed in 
different ways, much as she was, and that there were 
only two courses possible for them to brace the mind 
and set the heart against all that heart craved for, 
to sit ’at the banquet of life, fed on strange foods 
and fruits that satisfied not, and sickening for one 
drop of water, one crumb of common bread. . . 

Or . . . 

But, for the Celt, the maiden reared in Ireland, 
land of pure souls and bodies, there was no “or.” 

Again and again on her wanderings, Deirdre had 
met with love. 

At the first intoxication of her freedom, when 
she had realized her small fortune, and determinedly 
broken loose from all remonstrance or control, she 
had scorned to call herself anything but what, in 
law, she was — a wife separated from her husband. 
She had kept her own name, and called herself 
simply “Mrs. Rose.” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


37 


But in the hotels of the Continent, where, under 
the kindly chaperonage of Cook, her first fury of 
travel expended itself, she had learned just how 
most men regard a girlish, pretty creature, known 
as a separated wife. If the mill-owners of Belfast 
had paid little attention to the dreamy girl who. paid 
so little to them, so did not the Latin races take 
Deirdre Rose. She had had to leave a Marseilles 
pension, where a retired colonel of the French Army 
got into the lift with her every time she went up*or 
downstairs, and coolly tried to kiss "her, with the 
entire approval of the lift-boy, who -could not see 
what the young lady — without doubt ‘an actress — 
was making a fuss about. She had drifted to Spain, 
drawn by the romance -of mantillas, toreadors, bull- 
fights, and cachuchas. In Spain, she hired a duenna, 
and thought that all was well. But the duenna had 
to go to Mass, and while Deirdre was taking a quiet 
Sunday morning in the lounge, a young Spaniard of 
entirely gentlemanly manners, whom she had ‘not 
previously met, came up to her, and asked *her for 
lessons in English. She said she did not teach Eng- 
lish, or anything else. He, not at all abashed, sug- 
gested she should, at the least, teach him the verb 
“to love.’^ Deirdre retired indignantly to her room, 
and once safely behind locked doors, cried. It 
was clear that the pose of a separated wife would 
not do. 

She called herself a widow. She didinot like lying, 
but something had to be done; and besides, it was 
three years now, and the inquiry firm she employed 
to send her any news of Rogers had never sent any- 
thing but bills. She often told herself he^ must be 
dead. He had vanished from the Dublin Royal 
University, and the earth, it seemed, some time dur- 


38 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

ing the week of that “student marriage.” It was 
not much of a lie. . . . 

As a widow named Rose, she received two pro- 
posals In three months, and the unpleasant atmos- 
phere that had clung about her like a miasma, when 
she was known as a separated — possibly divorced — 
young wife, cleared almost altogether away. Then 
she met the inevitable somebody — feminine — ^who 
has always known oneself and one’s people. It hap- 
pened In Constantinople, where one might have been 
sure. . . . 

The feminine somebody asked loud questions. In 
public, about Deirdre’s husband. What member of 
the Rose family was he? The friend could not 
remember anyone. . . . When had he died? . . . 

Years afterwards, innocent Deirdre used to blush 
to the tips of her ears when she remembered that 
scene. 

It became clear that the name must go. After 
all, she was legally Mrs. Rogers. She would use 
her married name. And, In order to suggest some 
good broken-hearted sort of reason for refusal to 
re-marry, she would wear mourning — all the time. 
It would be ‘made very becoming — black had always 
suited her. 

Now for a time there was something like peace, 
and Deirdre, beginning to feel the first promptings 
of the talent that was to make her known; dreaming, 
to some purpose now, over her little wander-songs 
and the music that she wedded so cunningly to them, 
stayed for a while In lovely Orotava, gem of Tene- 
rlffe — the spot that caused old Humboldt to fall 
upon his knees and thank God, when first he saw 
its beauty. 

The hotel was full of English; she made a few 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


39 


friends among them, and thought them safer than 
the volcanic Spaniards, from whom, after her 
Madrid experiences, she kept carefully away. 

There she met Adrian Shaw. This is not the his- 
tory of Adrian Shaw, nor of Deirdre’s relations 
with him. He takes place in her story — the story 
of her long ^wanderings — only because of what he 
found out for her. 

They had fallen in love with each other. For 
the first time, Deirdre — twenty-five now, and tired, 
it may be, of flying from the face of Love wherever 
and however he met her — stayed, and confronted 
facts. She had half loved before now. A woman, 
young, pretty, unsatisfied of heart, cannot see the 
men of three continents flit through her “moving 
shadow-show” without casting more than one look, 
once in a way. But this time it was Love, Love with 
wings, arrows and bow, and she, struck, could fly 
no longer. 

You must remember that there was always hope. 
If Rogers was dead — as she was almost sure he 
must be — ^why, then, in three years more she would 
be free to remarry, provided she did not fear the 
risk of his possible, improbable return. One did 
not commit bigamy, after seven years. 

This may have been in her mind — one thinks it 
was — when she put on the prettiest of her pretty 
black, gauzy frocks for Adrian Shaw. Deirdre had 
not visited Spain without learning, at the least, how 
to make black the most charming, the most alluring 
of colours; an art understood from end to end by 
that supreme coquette, the Spanish woman. 

She knew, in these days, ho-w to place a rose so 
that it should light like rouge; how to underline the 
beauty of neck and shoulder by the careless-careful 


40 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


placing of a scarf ; how to use her fan as a butterfly 
uses its feathery antennae, and to show the tiny, 
Spanish-looking slipper beneath the flowing skirt, 
just so much as a sehorita shows it. Unconsciously, 
she had used these arts, up to the days in Orotava ; 
then she put forth, with full consciousness, every re- 
source of body and of mind. She meant to fascinate 
Adrian Shaw. She liked him; she thought she could 
do more than like him, if — 

The “if” was answered, with a vengeance. Shaw, 
a London barrister on a holiday, with an actor’s 
handsome face, and an athlete’s fine .figure, answered 
her lure as a bird answers the bird-catcher’s whistle ; 
and Deirdre, not without a prick of disappointment, 
realized one more truth — that this was, must be the 
way most women got their husbands. In novels, it 
was always the man who began. Perhaps there were 
no men anywhere in the world who did the beginning 
— all the beginning — themselves. Except, of course, 
terrible people like the Spaniard who wanted to learn 
English. . . . 

In the midst of her reflections, syllogisms, conclu- 
sions, Adrian Shaw swept down like a storm un- 
chained by a spell, and made such love to her, honest 
love that shamed no one, yet hot love that meant to 
have its way, that she ceased to think and draw 
conclusions of any kind. She told him the truth 
about herself — not without uneasiness, for surely it 
was a good deal to ask of any man, that he should 
believe her version of the thing, just as it had hap- 
pened. 

Shaw was — as he did not tell her — 'the shining 
light of divorce practice at that time in London. No 
member of the shrewd profession to which he 
belonged was better equipped with the special 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


41 


knowledge that enabled him to judge unerringly as 
to the truth of Deirdre’s tale. He summed the mat- 
ter up, privately, in a sentence : “Man a fool or a 
crank, girl straight as they make ’em.” To Deirdre 
herself, his summing was as follows : 

“Your inquiry agent is either a useless ass — ^most 
of them are — or in Rogers’ pay. Something should 
have been found out long ago. As for your rela- 
tions, they ought to be hanged. I’ll go to Dublin 
myself.” 

He went, and took with him a French detective 
who had done work of other kinds for him, and to 
whom this trifling little mystery of Deirdre’s would 
be, he expected, clear as glass. Deirdre stayed in 
the golden vale of Orotava, among the grapes and 
oranges and dragon trees, with the noble Peak .of 
Tenefiffe, crowned by its pillar of cloud by day, and 
pillar of fire by night, brooding over her and promis- 
ing, like the fire and the cloud that went before 
Moses, to show her the way into the Canaan of 
her dreams. 

Shaw came back. 

She met him down in the port of Santa Cruz. 
She had not been able to wait in Orotava — one could 
save a day by going down to the coast, -and meeting 
the steamer on its arrival. He walked with her up 
to Camacho’s; that trained lawyer face of his, in 
the midst of the staring crowds, kept its secrets to 
itself. Yet somehow — she knew. 

They sat under the dragon tree in the garden, 
while waiters ran backwards and forwards carrying 
trays, and folk from the steamer went about looking 
for unoccupied tables. They were not within ear- 
shdt of the other couples who were flirting, love- 
making, planning, within a few yards, but it was 


42 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


bitter to Deirdre to learn her fate — as she felt, m 
that moment, most women had to learn it — -before 
the eyes of the world. She did not need to hear 
what Adrian 'had to say; by what he did not say, 
she knew. 

He told her ‘that he had disentangled the whole 
skein, and that the disentangling-should have been — 
could have been — done long before. Her inquiry 
agent was a man of straw, who never worked for 
any client, so far as Shaw could ascertain, but lived 
upon blackmail and lies. His Frenchman had done 
the work in a couple of days. 

Rogers was alive. He was in a lunatic asylum. 
He had been there ever since a fortnight after the 
wedding. 

“But — ” said Deirdre, speaking for the first time 
(how strange the yellow Canarian sunlight looked, 
falling on the flagstones of the path — it seemed to 
have changed, mysteriously, in the last few minutes, 
and the commonplace people eating ices and drinking 
tea looked like fantasies on a Chinese screen) — 
“But—’’ 

Shaw answered her, without letting her go on. 
He looked much as usual, only that his eyes had a 
sleepless expression about the rims, and his mouth 
had — surely — grown narrower and sharper. 

“I thought of that at once. It’s no good. He 
was as sane as I am at the time — or if he wasn’t, 
there is no possible proof to the contrary. He was 
coaching third year Arts men up to the day he went 
off, and some of them took brilliant degrees. The 
lecturers who saw his notebooks said they were the 
ablest summing up of — anyhow, I read them myself, 
and I don’t think I could have done better. It seems 
he took a week’s holiday just after he married you, 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


43 


and went down into Wicklow for some fishing. I 
can guess why he did it; the same quixotic impulse 
that made him ‘set you free’ as he called it. Good 
God I Set you free! . . . Well, he went on from 
Wicklow to Cork, where he had relations; stayed 
with them for a day or two, and then, without any 
warning, suddenly and violently went off his head, 
and had to be put under restraint at once.” 

“Did you see the — ^^the — ” 

“The doctor? I did. He wouldn’t let me see 
the patient; said it would excite him too much; bad 
pse, practically hopeless. I put the matter to him, 
in a general sort of way. He said — I won’t trouble 
you with the medical details — that Rogers had been 
undoubtedly sane up to the day he went off his head; 
rather an uncommon, but not an unheard of case. 
I believe, as a matter of fact, that he met something 
like it before. . . . Well, I tried to make the 
wretched old beggar see reason — for if he’d only 
backed me up, there might have been a chance. He 
wouldn’t. Said he had not a doubt Rogers was ac- 
countable for his actions at the time — thought more 
of his medical reputation, and the interest of having 
a curious case, than of anything or anyone else. . . . 
I went back to the relations then. Thought I might 
get them to admit something useful. Would they, 
damn them! — Sorry, Deirdre; I couldn’t help it. 
But they were damnable. They wouldn’t admit any- 
thing. You see, if the trouble was what the doctor 
said, it was the kind of thing that isn’t in your family, 
but if it was what I wanted 'them to say, they’d have 
had to blacken themselves. I saw pretty soon that 
was no use. I wish I’d had one or two of them in 
the witness box with myself briefed for the»opposite 
side. I’d have given them gip, I would so . . .” 


44 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


Deirdre was beginning to feel as if she had had 
about all she could stand. The feeling is never true ; 
we can always stand a little more of it, whatever it 

is, and generally have to — ^but she was too young 
in misfortune’s school to have learned so much. She 
felt that Shaw was talking on, simply because he did 
not dare to stop ; that he could not say, in so many 
words, what both of them knew to 'be true. As long 
as it was not said, there seemed, somehow, to be 
hope. 

In such moments, the woman is often the braver. 
Deirdre was first to rush upon the spears. She broke 
without ceremony into her lover’s speech. 

“Then there’s no hope,” she said, and wondered 
how she could say it. But it seemed quite easy. 
People in plays and stories choked and gasped and 
staggered away into the night. She and Adrian 
Shaw sat on the bench beneath Camacho’s dragon 
tree, among the tea-drinking people, and ended their 
love, as one ends a piece that is played. One lifts 
one’s hands from the keys, the music stops. That 
is all. 

“He might always die,” said Shaw. 

“He won’t,” she answered. “I couldn’t wish him 
to, Adrian. The world’s a good place, in spite of 
everything. I can’t grudge him his little share of 

it. You know, he meant to be very kind.” 

“How much did you see of him?” asked Shaw. 

“I met him a few times. We went to the same 
debating society ; he used to speak, and I did, some- 
times. And he lent me books. ... It was a kind 
of dream; the sort of thing a young girl with an 
overdeveloped brain feeds on, and thinks so 
spiritual. One broadens, one understands better, as 
life goes on.” It was she who was talking to gain 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


45 


time now. She felt, with a cold chloroformed kind 
of pain, that this was the last of their talks — they 
would never talk again. . . . 

Neither could find anything to say after that. It 
was all, she thought, amazingly unlike the things 
in plays. He ought to have asked her to be “his 
wife in the sight of Heaven,” and she ought to have 
refused in a beautiful speech, tears in her voice — 
and then should have come the “staggering away.” 
. . . How astonished, amused, delighted, the tea- 
drinking people would have been! Why could she 
find nothing — Oh — he was speaking. 

“Well?” He got up from, the seat. “Well, have 
we got to say it?” It was hardly a question. It 
seemed that Shaw — unlike the typical “hero” — 
knew enough not to make a fool of himself. Yet 
there was a hint of something hopeful in the voice, 
not contained in the words. A suggestion of force 
withheld; floods that might be unloosed — if she 
chose. Perhaps no man, in such a case, feels utterly 
hopeless. 

He waited. The yellow sunlight of Santa Cruz 
filtered through dragon-tree boughs, lay in gold, 
round, unfocussed spots at his feet. There was a 
Spanish woman singing in an upstairs drawing room. 
Her voice was nasal and hard, but it rose joyously 
over its own defects; it was soaked in gold sunlight, 
in nights of love and stars. 

Deirdre heard it, and suddenly, like the bursting 
of a shell, pain burst over her at last. That was 
what she was giving up — for ever. She had to go 
on living, without that. 

There was no question in her mind; perhaps Shaw 
had known from the first, in spite of his starveling 
hope, that there would not be. A divorce court 


46 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

lawyer lives near enough to the Tree of Life to know 
good and evil without guessing about it. 

Nor was there thought, or hope, of delay. The 
thing had happened; that was all. 

Deirdre rose to her feet, and stood beside Adrian 
Shaw. The pain was getting very bad. 

“Oh, must you go?” was what she said, in a 
“society” tone of voice. She could not have said 
anything else, if the jewel-blue skies of Santa Cruz 
had been bound to fall on her as penalty for failure. 

Shaw understood. He was swearing violently to 
himself, cursing the Rogers family, the doctor, 
Rogers himself, Deirdre for her past folly, and 
present virtue, himself for getting caught in such a 
coil. Yet all the while another side of his mind 
kept whispering evenly, “It’s best; you know you 
couldn’t have held your own and got on, tied to a 
‘pretty housekeeper.’ She’s right. Yes, hang her, 
she’s right,” the other side of his mind allowed at 
the end of a few interminable seconds. 

^ “Yes, I’m sorry, I must; got an engagement,” was 
his answer which deceived no one, but covered an 
awkward gap. “May I ask your plans — going on 
to Las Palmas?” 

“Yes, tonight. The boat you came by will just 
suit.” She felt, now, she must get away — away. 

“Then — good-bye.” They were in the hall of the 
hotel. Shaw did not look to see if anyone were in 
sight or not. He took her up, kissed her, and walked 
out. 

And Deirdre went to her room, sat on the bed, and 
said, in the inevitable phrase that has borne so much 
of the world’s sorrow, “Oh, my God I” 

The Elder Dempster boat sailed six hours later. 
Shaw did not see her off ; did not see her, ever, again. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 47 

She was conscious of a small astonished pricking of 
annoyance when she saw, two months later, in a 
London magazine, the notice of his wedding. 

She did not get over it herself for quite six months. 
During that time she wrote the little, sad-sweet song 
of separated lovers, known to all singers as “Your 
Shadow On My Heart.” 

In time, the picture of Adrian Shaw grew dim, but 
the mark that he had left on her life remained. She 
knew, now, just what she was condemned to. 

“Well,” she said, “if I have got to bear some- 
thing, so has everyone else; and there’s always ‘the 
wind on the heath, brother.’ I’ll live for that, and 
as for human beings, not one of them shall lay hold 
on me again.” 

From South America, from Panama — then a 
fever-eaten, burned-out isthmus, little travelled — 
she drifted. She drifted to Easter Islands; to the 
Marquesas, eastward to the Gilberts, southward and 
westward again, by Australia and New Zealand, to 
Tahiti. There, because she felt the urge of music 
increase in her, she paused a little, shut herself in 
her room at the hotel, and wrote much of the day, 
coming out at times to play for a quiet hour on the 
piano — songs written and to be written, fragments, 
interpretations. 

And there the tourist party found her, on the 
night of the boat’s coming in. ^ 

She sat in her room, and listened to their talk, 
after she had slipped away. A word or two about 
the islands of the far Western Pacific, where she had 
never been, caught her attention. It seemed that 
one of the travellers had spent some months in the 
Solomons, going on to the New Cumberland group. 
The others thought him quite a hero on that account. 


48 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

“I suppose they are dangerous places,” the man 
was saying. “Anyhow, whether things happen or 
not, they always might. But there is a fascination 
in Melanesia.” 

“What is it?” 

“If I could tell you ! Those islands are brandy — 
absinthe rather, the liquor of fierce dreams. This 
Tahiti is honey. Mead, perhaps — she intoxicates 
you, too, does Tahiti, gently — sweetly. But the 
Cumberlands — ah, the Cumberlands! They’re like 
a wicked, beautiful, black and scarlet sunset, the kind 
that goes before an earthquake or a typhoon.” 

“They seem to be like a lot of things.” 

“Most of all like themselves ; that’s where it is. 
They would inspire a dead man. I shall go and 
look at them again some day.” 

“Oh, no, you won’t; your bride won’t let you.” 
It was an open secret that the traveller was going 
home to be married. 

“Well — ^brides and Melanesia don’t agree. I’ll 
have to jilt her.” There was laughing. 

The people left next day, and Deirdre never even 
saw the man who had cast out this chance seed of 
thought. But, thenceforward, the picture of the 
New Cumberlands, far away at the end of the Pacific, 
at the end of all things known, followed her even 
into dreams. She began to long for those fierce 
draughts that the traveller had spoken of; to sicken, 
as she had been sickening, already, without knowing 
it, of Tahiti mead and nectar. Dim wraiths of songs 
floated through her mind — verses and melodies un- 
bodied, yet wonderful. She thought that she might 
grasp them in that strange, seldom-travelled world. 
And the few last words that the traveller had 
dropped — “Brides and Melanesia don’t agree” — 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 49 

had an attractive, sweet-bkter sound to her. Love, 
it seemed, was not the spirit of the New Cumber- 
lands. It was all too plainly the spirit of Tahiti. 
She had had enough of that. She would go. 

So, across the seas and across the world, the 
wavering, uncertain track of Deirdre’s wanderings 
began at last to sense, far off, its ultimate goal. 


CHAPTER IV 


p\EIRDRE, the wanderer, sat in her deck chair, 
^ and saw the New Cumberlands draw near. 

She was the only woman on board. It happens 
so, often, on the little worn-out boats that ply 
through far, lonely Western Pacific groups. Th'e 
Solomons, the New Cumberlands, the great outer 
islands linking on to New Guinea — New Britain, 
New Ireland, Bougainville and Buka — are not at- 
tractive to travellers for pleasure. Even to-day, 
they are peopled by dangerous savages, have little 
or no hotel accommodation, and own an ill reputa- 
tion for fevers. Women travellers on the Western 
boats are missionaries, or traders’ wives, almost in- 
variably; and few in number at any time. 

It was a novelty to the captain and officers of the 
island steamship “Tyre” to carry a young and 
pretty woman, travelling apparently for pleasure. 
(“Though indeed,” as the mate said, “people who 
would go to the Western groups for pleasure would 
go to hell for fun.”) Off watch, there was always 
one of the white-clad, gold^buttoned sailormen ready 
to restrain the rebellious hind-legs of Deirdre’s 
chair, find books and magazines for her, and 
tell her interesting stories about the islands, very 
often true. They did not know that she was 
“Deirdre,” the writer of love-songs and wander- 
songs — though the second mate had “Gypsy Lover” 
50 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


51 


in his bunk, and the chief engineer hummed “Your 
Shadow On My Heart,’’ very flat, while he sat in 
his cabin figuring out how much coal he ought to 
burn back to Sydney, against how little he was going 
to be allowed.^ They only knew that she was a 
very nice looking young woman, more or less in 
miourning for somebody, and that her name on the 
passenger list was “Mary D. Rogers.” Deirdre 
owned Mary as a first name; she had found it a 
useful incognito at times. She did not want to be 
bored with talk about her songs, as a general rule, 
and the appearance of her name in full on any pas- 
senger List, or hotel register, meant discovery. In 
those early days of the century, Deirdre was a name 
so uncommon as to be almost unheard of, Gladyses, 
Marjories and Violets being all the mode. 

Mary D. Rogers, therefore, called Miss Rogers 
by the ship’s people, in the absence of any state- 
ment to the contrary, came up to the New Cumber- 
lands unknown. From the captain, mates, and en- 
gineer, she had heard enough about the place to 
frighten anyone not possessed o*f steady nerves. 
Fortunately, she was not nervous, and listened with 
calm interest to accounts of native murders, poisoned 
arrow shootings, free and undisturbed rifle firing 
across the harbour and the main roads of the islands, 
by natives who could not be called to account at the 
hands of the law, since no protectorate or annexa- 
tion, and consequently no laws, existed. She heard 
other things that interested her more ; of active vol- 
canoes that one could ascend in a morning, of amaz- 
ing native temples full of carvings, skulls, and 
mummies; of avenues of idols, and heathen “wish- 
ing arches,” black women who crawled on hands and 
knees past any man; towns where a woman who 


52 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


walked on one of the men’s special roads was in- 
stantly clubbed and hurried to the cooking pot. . . . 

She sat on deck, as the boat edged through the 
reefs, and rnade up her mind that she was going to 
like the New Cumberlands. MeliasI, the ridiculous 
townlet on the mainland, did not interest her very 
much, but the curious Island residences did. Almost 
every one of the high, peaky Islands dotting the huge 
harbour carried its tin-roofed bungalow, set on the 
extreme top with a W'lndlng path to lead up to it. 
She began to believe some of the wild tales she 
had heard about the Cumberlands. There was an 
unmistakable air -of fortification about these 'high, 
withdrawn residences, set safely In the midst of 
shark-infested sea, high above gunshot from the 
mainland bush. 

She was to stay at the Mission Island, if they 
would take her In — and the captain had no doubt 
they would. He was anxious to get her landed, she'd 
the mails, and go. The Me'liasi cargo could be 
lightered off in a couple of hours, and if the “Tyre” 
could be got away before sundown, it was a clear 
gain of a day. One did not take one’s ship out of 
unbuoyed, unllghted MeliasI In the dark, if one 
valued the continued possession of a master’s 
“ticket.” 

Deirdre travelled light; her luggage was soon out. 
The second mate looked at it perplexedly. 

“Honest to God,” he said, “I don’t see how we 
can spare a boat to go right over to Waka Island — 
Wawaka, I mean; the names of these Islands are 
enough to break a chart-maker’s heart; Waka, 
Wawaka, Wawa, Wakwak, Wakaka — some mean- 
ing in It to the nigs, I suppose. ... You see, the 
old man’s death on getting off before sundown, and 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


53 


It’ll take best part of two hours to pull there and 
back, and we want every boat we have to get out 
the cargo in. ^ Would you very much mind if we 
sent you over in a canoe ? I can get you a good local 
boy, and a fine canoe, safer than a boat any day, only 
you can’t shift much cargo in them.” 

“Which is Waka?” asked Deirdre, looking out 
at the tangle of green and blue, peaky islets, all so 
much alike. “The farthest?” 

“Oh, no. Two from the last. You can’t quite 
see It here, Wakaka hides it. That’s Wawa you’re 
looking at, just peeping round Wakwak — ” 

“Oh, don’t — you make me giddy,” laughed 
Deirdre. 

“And that one’s the pearlers’ Island — ^oh, my aunt! 
Don’t they have gay times in there I Fursey, the 
piratical chap I told you about. Is the head and front 
of them; there’s no divilment they aren’t up to 
when they’ve got a cargo of whisky on board. I 
reckon there’ll be a hot time In the old town to- 
night; we’ve got a lot of cases for them. It’s a good 
island, better than the Mission one. You’ll know 
the Mission island easy by the rows of native 
teachers’ houses they have on the far side. They’ll 
take every care of you, and delighted to have a 
visitor — ’tisn’t often they get the chance. Sure you 
don’t mind the canoe? We’re not quite the P. and 
O. or the Cunard up here, you know.” 

“Not in the least. Is that the canoe?” 

“Yes. We’re dropping an island boy here; good 
chap, well trained and can paddle like winking; they 
all can. He’ll run you ashore in no time, and you 
can give him a bob If you like. I’m awfully sorry 
to rush you so, but the old man — Yes, sir. Imme- 
diately. Yes, I’m seeing to it now. Quite all right. 


54 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


sir. — Hold on tight down the ladder; let me give 
you my hand. All right?” 

“All right.” 

“Good-bye till we come back; I’ll look you up then. 
Have a good time. Yes, sir. Coming now.” 

It seemed as if the ship, lying tall and black and 
red upon blue water, slipped away from the canoe, 
rather than the canoe from the ship, so smoothly 
did they go. Deirdre, perched upon a narrow cross- 
seat, with her trunk before her, felt the light move- 
ment and the flight of cooler air, delightful. The 
day had been a very busy one; every “last day” of 
a voyage is. She knew, suddenly, that she was very 
tired. Well, it would not take an hour to gelt to 
the Mission, and she would be all right there. The 
Mission headquarters in Sydney had guaranteed 
that. There was always someone in charge, they 
had always room, and were delighted to see, at any 
time, a visitor like her. She could not possibly stay 
anywhere else at Meliasi ; both Commissioners were 
bachelors, the “hotel” impossible, and the private 
houses not at all desirable. 

“I’ll get them to take the cost of my board,” 
thought Deirdre, to the pleasant swish-swash of the 
paddle. “I do hate sponging. . . .” 

She pulled the trunk behind her, leaned up against 
it, and half closed her eyes. She was really very 
tired. Not sleeping, yet not quite waking, she saw 
as in a dream the panorama of Meliasi harbour 
unfold; island stand up behind island, black main- 
land peaks peer out. She knew, now, what the 
traveller had meant when he spoke of the New Cum- 
berlands as wicked looking. It did not need the 
lurid tales she had been told, nor even the sight 'of 
a war-canoe full of armed and feathered natives. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


55 


posing diagonally a hundred yards ahead, to con- 
vince her this was no longer the South Sea Island 
world as she had known it. If Tahiti and the 
Tubuais and the Gilberts were a dream, Meliasi 
was a nightmare. A picturesque and fascinating 
nightmare, but a nightmare all the same. Hiere 
was the heavy heat, the brooding, sinister air of evil 
dreams; those black and purple hills upon the main- 
land, uninhabited by man, seemed as if they might 
well be the home of malicious goblin things. There 
was a new scent upon the air, one she had never 
smelled before. How many she recalled in other 
places: Tahiti was cocoanut oil and tiere flower; 
Vavau was oranges and fish; New Zealand, fern 
trees wet with rainbow showers; Santa Cruz de 
Teneriffe — she had not thought of that for long — 
how long? — was Gran Canaria cigars, wine-shops 
and dust. . . . This, at the utmost ends of earth, 
smelt of the end of the world. Deirdre did not know 
how, but it was so. The wild, strange odour of 
forest gums and spices, of torrent-soaked trees, of 
acrid bush fruits, rotting under their leaves, that 
touched her nostrils lightly at times, as the breeze 
veered and shifted, was the scent — she knew — of the 
very back of beyond. And she was in it. 

Was she awake or was she not? Black hands — 
black hands of this black country — holding her fast, 
closing round her heart. The voice of this black 
country, wicked and black, calling *her, insistently 
and low. Something that said to her — “This is the 
end; there is nothing farther away; here you can 
look over the edge of the world, and down into 
'Strange gulfs that you never knew existed — save in 
nightmares. You did not believe the nightmares, 
but they were true. Every dream is true of some- 


56 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

where ; the Cumberlands are the land of the strange, 
glowing, evil dream.” 

“Why have I come?” she thought she said — was 
it to herself, or to the spirit of Meliasi? “What 
did I think to find?” She did not remember that 
she had thought to find nothing, rather, to lose 
something she had already found. She was in that 
trance-like, half-sleeping state that is above all others 
the state of second-sight. 

“What shall I find?” she thought again, forming 
the words with her lips, and seeing, ^through half- 
closed eyes, the harbour and the hills all red with 
sunset, and the Mission island rising close at hand, 
she knew there would be an answer. It came; but 
there were no words. It was a feeling of some- 
thing great; of something terrible, of a splendour 
beyond all speech, and a fear that tore. . . . 

The dream — trance — call it what one will — 
broke. 

“Goodness, I’ve been just about asleep,” she 
thought, sitting up and looking about her. The sun 
was all but down; dark ready to stride out. A 
space of water in front of the canoe, black-^crimson 
in the sunset, was bounded by a narrow beach 
and a boat-jetty. She judged them to be half a mile 
away. 

“It will be dark by the time we get there,” she 
thought, looking at the last spark of the sun as it 
dipped behind the sea-line of the harbour mouth. 
It grew dusk almost as she formed the words ; never, 
in southern latitudes, had she seen light die away 
so quick. She felt suddenly, unpleasantly alone ; the 
silent native who had paddled her was scarcely a 
human being, as one ranked the brown people of 
farther east and south; the beach of the Mission 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


57 

island was deserted. She could not see the native 
teachers’ houses, but she remembered, now, that they 
were at the other side of the hill. She had called 
out the name of the place — Wawa — ^to the native, 
as they paddled away from the ship’s side, and he 
had nodded, and repeated it after her. Now he 
suddenly shifted on the bamboo perch he used for 
a seat, and spoke, for the first time since the start. 

“Wawa I” he shouted, pointing with his paddle. 

Deirdre showed him a shilling. The native, with 
a bark that seemed meant to express pleasure, swung 
to his paddle again, and made the canoe fly through 
the water. They were up to the beach in a quarter 
of an hour. Nevertheless, when the keel ground 
into clinking coral shale, it was dark, save for a 
faint reflection of red from water and sky, and 
Deirdre could see nothing but an ivory-pale line of 
beach, and a black wall of trees behind. 

“Oh, look here,” she remonstrated, “this won’t 
do ; take me to the other side ; I can’t land here. I 
don’t know the way.” 

The native answered her in a flood of New Cum- 
berlandese. 

She pointed to the sea, and made signs with her 
hands, to express going round. The savage, how- 
ever, without taking any notice, pulled his canoe 
up on the beach, slung out her trunk, dumped herself 
after it with one powerful swing of his arms, and 
fairly snatched the shilling from her hand. 

“Wawa !” he shouted in a tone that was evidently 
meant to convey, “I’ve put you ashore where I said 
I would, and I’m hanged if I’ll do any more.” 

“But — ^here — come back!” cried Deirdre. She 
did not like this at all. 

The native never even turned his head. A black 


58 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

shadow among shadows red and black, he glided 
from the beach, and was melted into dusk. 

“Beast,” said Deirdre to herself unemotionally — 
it did not seem to matter very much after all. “Now 
all I can do is to wait for the moon.” She sat on 
her trunk, and waited. She knew the moon was due 
in half an hour. 

It came, a bright silver segment rising through 
trees as a bubble rises through water, and showed 
her what she had been waiting for — a track. She 
had known there must be one, since there was a 

, . ... 

“The trunk must wait, she said, dragging it into 
the shelter of the bush. “Some of the Mission boys 
can get it, later. There must be lots of them, if 
this track is a sample of the way things are done.” 

For the track was really astonishing — a flight of 
solid concrete steps, leading up and up by evenly 
graduated slopes to some invisible goal on the top 
of the island. In the waxing moonlight, flowers be- 
came visible, planted along the sides — scarlet-belled 
lilies, tuberose, alamanda, cannas striped with gold. 
There were concrete seats on the way, canopied over 
with trellises of flowers. Somewhere about half-way 
up, a little stream had been trained to cross the path, 
and to fall, in passing, through a pipe of hollowed 
stone, tempting the wayfarer to stoop his mouth 
and drink. 

“For a little mission house at the end of the 
world, they seem to do themselves well,” thought 
Deirdre. 

She mounted up and up, and so did the moon, 
making of Meliasi harbour an onyx floor, set with 
stripes of silver. The islands near at hand were 
in shadow, great peaks that cut triangles out of the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


59 


stars, on one or two faint lights were showing. 
Deirdre wondered which of them might be the in- 
famous pearlers’ island of which she had heard on 
the voyage; the island where a gang of beadh- 
combers lived, richly and sensually, on the proceeds 
of pearls obtained by native divers who were prac- 
tically enslaved, and whose lives to their cruel mas- 
ters were counted scarce worth the value of one 
single pearl. It was the shell known commonly as 
“lapi-lapi,” -they had told her; one got magnificent 
pearls at times out of it, but the shell itself was worth 
next to nothing; so you had to drive your niggers 
to get profits. . . . 

An ugly story, that, of the hospital nurse who 
had come up to Meliasi some year or two past, to 
look after the wife of a wealthy planter in her con- 
finement. The nurse was young and pretty, and 
somewhat flighty. After her case was out of hands, 
she had gone picnicking in a sloop owned by Fursey, 
chief of the pearling crowd. She had not come back 
to Meliasi. . . . There had been a terrible scandal. 
Nobody on the “Tyre” seemed inclined to tell the 
story; they only hinted. One thing was clear, that 
the nurse had gone down to Sydney by the next boat, 
and disappeared after. It was also said that a 
French planter — supposed to be the employer of the 
nurse — but even that seemed uncertain — ^had called 
out Fursey and put a bullet through him. Fursey, 
apparently, had not been killed, or even very badly 
hurt, since he figured in one or two other lurid tales 
of later date. ... 

Up and up and up. . . . This Mission island was 
certainly bigger, and higher, than she had fancied 
it to be when pointed out by the mate. But she was 
nearing the summit now; she could see more stars 


6o 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


every minute, and the wind, shut off during that long 
ascent, had begun to blow again, wild and strong 
and smelling of forests and sea. 

The house at last! 

One came upon it suddenly, round a sort of cliff 
corner. It stood on a small, artificially levelled flat, 
covering almost the whole summit of the island. It 
was large, astonishingly so for such a God-forsaken 
spot as the New Cumberlands — ^built of the same 
solid concrete that composed the steps; terraced all 
round, and presenting a blank face of pilastered con- 
crete to the arriving guest, with just one opening in 
the middle, an archway that seemed to lead into a 
Spanish-style inner court or patio. 

Deirdre was on familiar ground now; she knew 
instinctively just What she must find inside — a paved 
yard, with cloistered galleries surrounding it; a foun- 
tain-in the centre, trellises, beds, tubs of flowers and 
flowering trees. And it was so. 

She walked in under the archway. There was 
not a sound; the place seemed uninhabited. Yet it 
could not be, for there was a huge oil lamp swinging 
on a chain stretched across the court, and it was 
lighted. That must have been done no more than 
an hour ago. Besides, she smelt wood smoke. Per- 
haps the family had gone out down to the boat, 
and left a native boy in charge. 

Experience taught her where to look for the 
kitchen. She peered in. There was nobody at all 
in the neat, white-tiled little room; but a lamp was 
burning here too, the stove was alight, and a large 
covered saucepan, -simmering over carefully stacked 
billets, sent forth a pleasant smell. 

“They are expected immediately,” she thought. 
“If the rest of the house is up to sample, I am in 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS , 6i 


for a pretty good time. I think I ought to turn 
New Cumberland missionary myself.” 

Outside, on the windy platform, with the sea 
booming round the base of the island a long way 
below, she stood and listened. She thought — was 
almost sure — she heard the rattle of oars in row- 
locks somewhere near the point where the jetty 
must lie. The overhang of the island hid the land- 
ing-place, however, and she had to be content with 
guessing. 

There was no use staying outside, when she had 
really arrived at last. The Mission people would 
be back in no time, and she would present her letter, 
and would no doubt be pleasantly received. In the 
meantime, as the weather looked to be on the change, 
and great, rainy clouds were sweeping over the moon, 
the thing to do was to get indoors. 

Within, she met with a check. There were no 
lamps lighted, except the big one in the courtyard, 
and she could not find a match anywhere. Impos- 
sible to distinguish one room from the other, im- 
possible to do anything but sink into a dimly seen 
chair, make the best of things, and wait. She knew 
how it was in the islands on steamer day. She ought 
to know. . . . 

Deirdre sat straight up in her chair, her hands 
pressing hard on the thick silk cushions. She knew 
that she had been sleeping; not very long, was it? 
It did not feel long, but it must have been longer, 
and she must have been sleepier, than she thought, 
for the missionaries had come back. She could hear 
them, now, in the outer room — (She was in an inner 
room, bedroom or sitting room, she did not know 
which) — talking and laughing, very loudly, and 
pulling chairs about. The outer room was lighted; 


62 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


she could see a vivid oblong of orange falling on the 
flagstones of the corridor, some way off. Dinner 
seemed just starting; plates were being rattled, and 
the smell of good things made her feel desperately 
hungry. 

Yet she delayed — with her hands pressing on the 
arms of the chair, and her body leaning forward — 
ready to rise and join the party in the dining room ; 
with the civil speeches she had composed trembling 
on her lips, and the letter from the Mission head- 
quarters lying in the pocket of her serge travelling 
skirt. Something kept her back — shyness, uncer- 
tainty, she did not know what. It seemed as if she 
were petrified. 

Then happened something that petrified her in 
good earnest. Only a word — a word sharply rapped 
out by someone in the dining room, on the crash of 
a breaking glass. But it was a word that one could 
not, by any possibility, hear in a missionary house. 

Deirdre sat and listened, her mouth fallen open, 
her breath coming quick. She could not have moved, 
now, had the roof been collapsing over her head. 

The word was repeated, followed by a string of 
curses. Then someone with a hard clear voice like 
a bit of glass, said: 

“Are you the ermine, that dies of a spot on its 
innocent fur?” There was a sort of drawl in the 
tone. You could tell that the owner of it had some 
whisky, but not too much. On the other hand, the 
man who had sworn was thick-voiced and almost 
stuttering. 

A burst of laughter followed the clear-voiced 
man’s remark. It seemed to be thought very funny 
that the swearing man should be called innocent. 

“Only a glass of burgundy, man, it’s not blood,” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 63 

chipped in a third speaker. “Haven’t you got a 
laundress?” 

This also was apparently thought to be hu- 
mourous; there was another general laugh. And 
then — 

“Has he got a laundress?” demanded someone 
else. (“More of them?” cried Deirdre’s terrified 
soul). “Say, you fellows, has Fursey goit a laun- 
dress? How many laundresses has little Fursey 
got?” 

If Deirdre could have described her feelings in 
that moment, she would have said that it was as if 
she had swallowed a bomb, and the bomb had just 
exploded. Fursey! Good God! She had missed 
the Mission island, landed on the pearlers’ island by 
some mistake — ‘probably misapprehension of those 
puzzling native names — and was at that moment in 
the heart of the beachcombers’ stronghold. 

The tales she had been ’hearing on the steamer 
rushed through her mind -in a torrent. She remem- 
bered that she was, for the first time in her life, be- 
yond the help and the protection .of the law. The 
New Cumberlands had none. There was no one to 
call Fursey and his crew to account if they choose 
to hold her captive, kill her, worse than kill her. 
They were evidently on the verge of a drinking 
bout — one of those orgies the mate had spoken of. 
When once they were crazed with spirits. . . . 

In books, the persecuted heroine always had a 
revolver or a dagger at hand, and usually threatened 
in a grand scene to kill herself or her persecutors. 
If not, there was always the hero ; one relied on him 
to turn up at the right moment. 

But Deirdre had no weapon, and no hero. What 
was she to do? Escape? She remembered that she 


64 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

had come to the room in which she was sitting 
through that outer one that was now lit up for the 
diners. No way out there. This Spanish patio style 
of building might be romantic, but it was likely to 
prove an ill happening for her that Fursey had 
fancied it for his home. Such a building is entered, 
for the most part, by one door only, the door opening 
on the patio ; 'all other doors give access to the patio 
itself, but not to the outer world. It seemed to her 
that the dining room, from its situation, must be 
next the patio archway, and if that was so, she had 
not a dog’s chance of getting out. 

What then? What did women in like case do? 
What bad they done, for hundreds — thousands — of 
years? This was not the twentieth century as far as 
she was concerned; it was the dawn of history, with 
Goths and Huns unchecked *by religion or by law, 
raiding as they would. She had to depend on her- 
self, and do as an Italian maiden would have done, 
in the sack of Rome. She would have to hide. 

Where? 

Deirdre, blood up now, and heart beating steadily 
— for she must not, she must not, lose her self-pos- 
session, or all was over — strained her eyes to see 
through the dusk, and make some guess as to where 
she was. These were the times before cheap power 
plants made electric lighting easy; before acetylene 
and air gas were used in far colonial possessions. 
Big, blazing kerosene lamps, that heated all the 
room, were the only way of lighting. It followed 
that one did not light these hot, wasteful lamps un- 
less obliged to do so. Only the dining room in all 
the house was lighted; the far side of the patio, as 
Deirdre saw it from a pale window opening, was in 
deep shadow; the room that doubtless opened out 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 65 

of the one she was sitting in must be unlighted too. 
A sudden dart of fear shot through her. This big, 
high-ceilinged apartment, next the dining room, must 
be a drawing room of some kind, and it, too, must 
have its communicating door, after the fashion of 
tropic houses. The men, when they had eaten and 
drunk, would doubtless move in to the larger and 
cooler room. If anything induced them to open the 
door — now — 

She slipped to her feet as quietly as a cat, and 
began to feel along the farther wall. The door — 
the handle. Turn it very softly, close it behind, very 
softly indeed. What was this room? A bedroom; 
there was light enough to tell so much. One could 
not mistake the white tower of mosquito netting, and 
the gleam of gilded china set on marble. What was 
the long pale thing in a corner; it looked like a coffin 
covered with white. . . . Oh — a box ottoman. Lift 
the lid; feel inside. What a large one, and nothing 
in it, either, except a little box of smelly moth-balls. 
It seemed, by the feel, to have a deep valance all 
round its padded lid. Now if one wanted to hide 
in a place like that, one could slip the little box 
under the edge of the lid, hidden by the valance, 
and it would give one air. 

She saw it all clearly. She would slip into the 
box, wait until the house was quiet, and then, when 
the pearling gang were sleeping their heavy drunken 
sleep, she would slip out again, and get away. If 
there was no canoe about the beach of the island, she 
would hide herself among the brushwood where she 
had hidden her trunk, and watch for a native 
paddling by. The Mission island could not be far 
away; she would arrive there early in the morning, 
and by mid-day this horrible experience would seem 


66 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


like some wild nightmare fancy, born of the dark- 
ness, and swept away by dawn. If she only kept 
her head, and carried out her plan, she could be in 
no danger. 

Not knowing how long she had slept that perilous 
sleep in the silken chair, she did not know, either, 
how long the men had been drinking, but she fancied 
it could not have been a very great while, for they 
were not violent. From the bedroom, she could 
hear popping of corks, clinking and occasional break- 
ing of glasses, voices that rose loudly now and then, 
a song or two, but evidently Fursey’s gang had not 
worked up to their best; it would probably be a long 
time before — What was that they were — someone 
was — singing? Oh — “Gypsy Lover.” That was 
the worst of being a popular composer — to hear your 
most delicate fancies roared out by a drunken — but 
was he roaring? Was he drunk? It seemed not. 
The singer had a good voice, clear and true as a 
crystal bell; he sang well, and the refrain of the 
song, taken up by two or three voices in the crowd, 
went with an excellent swing. Someone did howl 
out the last, long-drawn note like a wolf seeking his 
prey; but another voice — she thought, the voice of 
the crystalline singer — called sharply, “Cut it, Fur- 
sey, that’s too good to spoil,” and the howl ceased. 

Deirdre, crouching on the box like a cat ready to 
spring, half her brown-gold hair fallen down, her 
shoes off, her black skirt and white petticoat well 
tucked up for action, was a strange picture in the 
clearing moonlight, if she could have seen herself. 
She had almost forgotten where she was; the com- 
poser’s ecstasy at the sound of those men’s voices 
singing her song had fallen on her, and her small face 
glowed like a white lamp lit by inward flame. She 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 67 


was excited beyond her own knowledge. It had been 
in all ways a trying and exciting day, ending with this 
mad adventure that was by no means over yet; the 
evening was furnace-hot, the scents of frangipanni, 
trumpet flower, male paw-paw, just outside the win- 
dow, were like sensuous strains of music whispering 
in the night. Deirdre, young, fair, heart-starved 
now and ever, had but one outlet for the romance 
that flowed upward from the sunless caverns of her 
soul. In her songs, she said that which she could 
not say otherwise ; she set free the love that had no 
earthly goal. 

Tonight, crouched there upon the cushioned box, 
her fallen hair sparkling in the moonlight about her 
rapt pale face, there came to her what should have 
been the end of her most famous song — “Your 
Shadow On My Heart” — and was not. 

“Oh, oh, if I had written it like that!” she 
breathed. The new strain was enchanting. She 
whispered it under her breath, to words that came 
somehow — anyhow — words did not matter very 
much after all — 

“Your shadow on my heart. . . . 

O Love, look up with me, and see at last. 

When our long agony is overpast. 

In rainbow rays the clouds afar shall roll, 

Leaving your light. Love’s light, the light of Heaven, 

For ever in my soul!” 

So, and so, and so, k should go. . . . She would 
publish a new edition. ... 

Down she came from her heights again, to realize 
her small cramped figure on the box, the heat and 
the fierce insistent scent of island flowers, the moon 
growing clear outside ; inside from the dining room — 

No — ^was it possible? The scraping of chairs on 
a polished floor — voices — footsteps — 


68 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


Yes ! 

She swung herself off the box, heart beating like 
a frightened little rabbit’s — for now she realized the 
danger of the position that she found herself In — 
dived head first into the refuge she had chosen, lay 
down as flat as she could, and propped the lid, under 
its shielding frill, with the little box of moth-balls. 

Tt was terribly hot; in a moment she felt herself 
streaming like the black-skinned natives who shifted 
cargo in the holds of the steamer “Tyre.” But there 
was air enough to breathe, and she did not think 
the box would cramp her badly, if she had not to 
stay all night in it — which chance might Heaven for- 
bid, for how could one get safely out and away in 
daylight ? 

Footsteps, some of them unsteady and lurching, 
wandering about the rooms. Sounds of heavy bodies 
sinking down on chairs and lounges. A strong smell 
of cigars, drifting through the draughts of the 
propped box lid, afterwards : a smell of coffee. Talk 
like a roaring river, one voice indistinguishable from 
another. By and by, footsteps nearing the bed- 
room; pausing — coming in. 

Deirdre in the darkness of the box, prayed hard, 
she hardly knew what. She heard two men enter 
the room. They seemed to have something to say 
to one another, about some other of the guests — 

“Fursey — just like him — never asked — no one 
could stop him, when he’s — ” 

“Oh, yes, it was better not to. Old Steve ! a wily 
bird in his way, mind you. No unnecessary rows.” 

“Yes, but when anyone does get right across his 
hawser — ” 

“Grant you! You going home?” 

“Reckon so. All my cargo to tally off tomorrow 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 69 

morning early if I don’t mean to let anyone else 
snaffle my trade. The nigs are down in dozens to 
buy.” 

“Did you get the extra cartridges off Steve?” 

“He said I might take them and be damned (to 
me.” 

“Then you won’t have to pay?” 

“Suppose the damn’s the pay. Where did he say? 
Bedroom — box — Lord, the place is full of boxes.” 

“Oh,” shrieked Deirdre’s frightened little soul 
silently. “Oh, my God, don’t let them look in this 
one.” She drew herself together like a scared kit- 
ten, huddled at the bottom of the chest. 

One of the men paused, it seemed, to light a cigar. 
She heard the scratch, smelt the smoke. The feet 
of the smoker seemed to be just beside her box. 

“Which one was it?” asked a voice, with short 
pauses filled by puffs. 

“Try the camphorwood.” They seemed to try 
it, and drew a blank. “They might be in the chest 
of drawers.” A sound of drawers pulled out. 
“Would they be here? No. What’s that cushiony 
thing?” 

Deirdre gritted her teeth together. 

“That’s not a box. One of them fancy sofa 
things. Flash place, isn’t it?” 

“My oath. Here’s the cartridges. Did he say 
all?” 

“I reckon he meant it. There’s nothing mean 
about him, I will say that. You take one lot. Here, 
come along, they’re going. We’ll miss the boat.” 

Deirdre, breathing in short pants of relief, down 
at the bottom of her box, was conscious, neverthe- 
less, of an odd sensation of disappointment. It 
seemed to her that the orgie of the pearling island 


70 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


had fallen short of specification. She had, uncon- 
sciously, expected something like Nero’s feast in 
“Quo Vadis.” It would undoubtedly have been fun, 
whispered the adventure spirit in the girl, to have 
lain there safe and silent, and heard all the “goings- 
on.” But they had been comparatively quiet on the 
whole; they had really -not “gone on” at all. She 
wondered who the man could be who had sung her 
song so well. Whatever she had thought to carry 
away as memory from an “orgie” at Fursey’s notor- 
ious home, it was not the recollection of her own 
delicate music, beautifully sung. 

Well, all the better; Fursey would be going to 
sleep now — she hoped, not in that room — and when 
he was asleep would be her time. Yes, they were de- 
parting. She heard the clatter of hurricane lamps, 
voices in the verandah, rough laughter as someone 
staggered and fell; calls for “an arm to help a chap 

down these steps.” Dogs barked furiously 

outside; there were calls for natives — “Bobo, 
you black swine!” “Here, Wala, give a hand and 
be damned to you!” Then, as the guests passed 
over the brow of the cliff, a sudden silence; only 
the soft pitter-patter of the palms outside the house, 
in the stream of the night-wind, and the faint, far 
hushing of the surf on the harbour reef. 

She heard Fursey, by and by, come back alone. 
He walked lightly, yawning a little. In the dining 
room he moved about for a minute or two, putting 
out lights, and then came his nearing step, and the 
sudden glare of light through the valance, that 
showed he was coming in, lamp in hand. 

The devil of adventure that lived in Deirdre 
prompted her, frightened as she was, to peer out 
through a tiny opening in the valance, and see what 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


71 


manner of man this might be, who was the figure in 
countless tales of violence and evil, who terrorized 
the Cumberlands with his gang, flouted the British 
Commissioner, killed, stole, carried off helpless 
women to his eyrie, as an eagle carries its prey. 

She received the shock of her life. 

Fursey was tall, slight, well made and well dressed, 
with a refined, clean-shaven face, and the bearing of 
a gentleman. He had long, neat hands, artist hands. 
She saw his eyes, undershadowed by the lamp; they 
were handsome eyes, bright, and rather thoughtful. 
Could this truly be — 

“Impossible,” she thought. But the terrible 
stories came back into her mind. Fursey must be, 
of his kind, like certain bad, innocent-seeming 
women; a face that one could like and trust covering 
a soul that was rotten to the core. Deirdre had met 
such women, in her wanderings. 

She resisted the impulse that prompted her to 
come out of hiding, apologize for her presence, and 
ask simply for a boat to take her on to the Mission. 
She crouched, hidden and waited. 

The man set down the lamp, yawned, stretched, 
and disappeared into an adjoining room. It seemed 
to be a bathroom by the noise he made. By and by 
he passed through the bedroom again, in a suit of 
silk pajamas, blew out the lamp as he went by and 
vanished on to the verandah, where a sound of creak- 
ing and settling down proclaimed that he had gone 
to bed. 

Deirdre had calculated on this, knowing that in 
the islands no one used bedrooms unless obliged by 
stormy weather. Now — or soon — ^was her time. 
She hoped that Fursey was a snorer. 

He was not, but after half an hour or so of wait- 


72 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


ing, hearing no sound, she thought it safe to try. 
Shoes tied to her belt, and skirt pinned up, she 
slipped out of the box, and lowered the lid sound- 
lessly. 

She had entered in the darkness; she went out in 
brilliant moon-shine. There was plenty of light 
now; clouds racing swiftly in some upper current of 
wind, obscured the face of the moon from time to 
time, but dark was gone. It was a wild, white, 
merry night; the adventurer in Deirdre, the part of 
her that had budded into those matchless gypsy 
songs, was all awake. She could not, for the life of 
her, have recaptured the mood that had, a little while 
ago, brought forth another verse to her chief love- 
song. Love and adventure are twins; she knew it, 
but one twin led the other, by far, in this merry 
moonlight. 

“What next?” she asked herself, gliding shoeless 
down the steps of the verandah, and across the court- 
yard, where the alamanda swung gold censers to the 
moon, and croton tree like Moses’ burning bush, 
crimson and yellow as flame. The hammered iron 
gateway was in shadow. She felt it; found the latch 
— lifted it — 

Locked ! 

Round the cloisters of the patio she went, peering 
everywhere, searching in all corners. Room after 
room palely lighted by the moon, she looked into. 
Bedrooms handsomely furnished; sitting rooms, a 
billiard room, locked doors that might lead to any- 
thing, another iron grille at the back. All locked or 
doorless, save for doors that opened on the patio. 
She was a prisoner. 

“So that*s the next,” she thought, coming back at 
last to the arched doorway by which she had first 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


73 


gone in. “I might have known — in a place like the 
New Cumberlands. Oh, I wish I were not so hun- 
gry. I wonder, have they left anything in the dining 
room? No matter what becomes of me, I can’t do 
any good by starving.” 

She found the dining room. There was food in 
plenty on the table. She ate, nor disdained the com- 
fort of a glass of some rich Spanish wine, from a cut 
and gilded decanter. The world looked better after- 
wards. 

“I shall get away all right in the morning,” she 
thought, pocketing a few cakes and a tangerine 
orange or two, for possible emergencies. 

It was best not to return to the box, she judged, 
since that room was more or less in use. One of the 
bedrooms on the other side of the patio had a large 
high bed. She might hide under that when she heard 
anyone coming, and for the rest of the time, sit on 
the floor behind the bed-head. The box was really 
too hot. 

With her plunder in her pockets, she crossed the 
patio again, entered the empty room, and crouched 
down in a safe place on the floor. She did not feel 
sleepy now. She lay with her hands under her head, 
listening to the faint, weird noises of the night-owls 
wailing; fruit-bats squeaking among banana trees; 
the “pretty creature” of a wandering wagtail; the 
far-off hushing of the surf. Somewhere on the ceil- 
ing a ray of moonlight came and went, filtered 
through waving trees. She lay and watched it, and 
wondered. . . . 


CHAPTER V 


CTEPHEN CONN, sober, though cheered with 
^ good wine, let out the last of his guests, and 
went slowly back to the house. 

It had been a pleasant evening on the whole. Des 
Roseaux was always amusing and witty; the British 
Commissioner, though he did not talk much, listened 
excellently. Riley, the hotel keeper, knew how to 
behave himself when asked out to dinner. The 
planters and traders had, some of them, drunk too 
much, but no one had been rowdy. Fursey was the 
only jarring note. Of course, when he had come 
up at Meliasi jetty, drunk enough to be quarrelsome, 
and had demanded a lift to his island, Conn had 
given it, to avoid a scene before his guests. And 
when Fursey, growing more drunk, as the spirits 
mounted to his head in the cool night air, had landed 
with all the rest on Wawa, and accompanied them 
up to Conn’s house as an invited guest, it had still 
seemed best to make no objection. He had been 
there before, though not often: not at all since the 
day when Conn had been told that the two shots 
fired at him from the bush were Fursey’s. So far, 
Blackbury had not managed to get him deported; no 
man-of-war had called, and without the man-of-war, 
nothing could be done. It was best to keep the peace 
74 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 75 

until forced to break it. Conn knew that would 
probably happen; meantime, he would see as little 
as he could. 

So Fursey, as one of the dinner guests, ate Conn’s 
good food, and drank his wines, the best in the New 
Cumberlands. And he grew so rapidly helpless that, 
after all, he got very little in anybody’s way. He 
had rather rudely interrupted Conn’s rendering of a 
favourite song; well, that was another item in the 
score being run up against him. It would be paid 
some day. Conn paid debts. Meantime, it might 
be put aside. 

A pleasant evening. Conn, at peace with the 
world, went into his handsome house, humming 
some little tune or other. He liked asking people 
up to that triumph of island splendour; he liked 
feeding them with rare dainties and good wines, and 
hearing them say, for the fortieth time, that no one 
had such fine cigars. Success was pleasant on his lips 
that night. And best of all was the thought he 
cherished — ^that his secret was his own. Not a soul 
in all the New Cumberlands knew what he got, or 
where he got it. A wise old man far away in Mel- 
bourne knew; a man with a face like pictures of the 
Doctors in the Temple, and a long majestic beard; 
a man who was rich, and growing richer, because of 
what Conn sent him down. How did he send it? 
That, too, was his secret. He laughed a little to 
himself, thinking of the persecutions, the bribes, the 
bullyings, the wheedlings, that the local post-master 
had undergone because of this unsolved mystery. 
While all the time. 

He yawned and went to bed. 

Next day, in the ordinary course of things, he 
would have been over to Meliasi in his boat, seeing 


76 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

to the disposal of the cargo that had come on the 
“Tyre.” But the mail had brought him letters that 
demanded a quiet day. The cargo could wait. No 
one was likely to climb up to the summit of Wawa 
that morning, or that afternoon. His guests of the 
previous night would most of them be feeling the 
effects of his lavish entertainment. As for the pearl- 
ing crowd from Fursey’s, he rather imagined they 
had had a spree that would keep them quiet for the 
day. He had seen the cases of whisky coming off 
the “Tyre.” 

Fursey! What a brute the fellow was, and how 
determined to get himself, Steve Conn, in some way 
or other! Conn did not undervalue his enemy, for 
all that the enmity was not open. As he moved 
about his house that sunny, windy morning, a cigar 
between his lips, peace and an almost boyish pleasure 
in the possession of all these fine things filling his 
heart, he thought now and then of Fursey, the speck 
in the fruit, the drop of bitter in the cup. Fursey 
was certainly on his mind today. 

What Fursey would have given to be in the locked- 
up enclosure that morning, to see what was going 
to be done! Conn had shut out the houseboys; he 
took no chances. It was ten o’clock now, growing 
hot, but the trade-wind kept on its job, and rattled 
gaily among the palm leaves of the patio, flinging 
about the spray of the fountain that was the only 
one in the whole Western Pacific, and the joy of its 
owner’s heart. He crossed the patio to the far side, 
where the untenanted bedrooms were, and went 
down the long concreted pavement, sighing just a 
little, on this fair south-east-wind morning, for some- 
thing softer, gentler, than himself to tread those 
corridors, flit in and out of those rich empty rooms; 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 77 

rustle white dresses up and down the steps of the 
fountain. . . . 

The black woman or the white “left-over” — that 
was a man’s choice in the islands ; and a poor choice 
it was. Lean, elderly maids, with nervous manners, 
came to the Mission sometimes, stayed a year or two, 
married a missionary, maybe, maybe went away un- 
wed. They were no mates for Conn. Planters’ 
wives, now and again, brought up an unmarried sis- 
ter to keep house and drudge with children; a sister, 
usually, who could not be “got off.” They tried to 
get her “off” through the medium of Meliasi’s one 
rich man, who was scarcely grateful to them. Conn, 
being entirely human, had a fair appreciation of his 
own value. He had always meant to find something 
really good — -some day. But he was tied, had been 
tied for some years, to the New Cumberlands. Why, 
was his secret. 

It was something in the light — or in the wind — 
or in the rainy pattering of the fountain — or maybe 
in the scene of the paw^paws and trumpet flowers — 
but, anyhow, the place seemed curiously solitary that 
morning, solitary, and yet haunted. Almost he could 
fancy that he heard a woman’s footsteps, where no 
woman’s footsteps ever came, treading delicately 
the white cool pavement underneath the patio 
arches; that a rustle of light garments sounded some- 
where among the rooms where no one slept. . . . 

It was the wind in the young cocoanuts; it was the 
sound of the bougainvillae blossoms beating against 
the stones of the verandah arches. There was no 
one there. 

He crossed over again into the dining room. The 
boys had not cleared away yet; he did not choose 
to have them inside the enclosure that morning. A 


78 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

bit of bread and fruit would do him for breakfast. 
Those mandarins, the Chinese kind, not the large 
island sort, that had come up for him on yesterday’s 
steamer — they would go well. His guests had been 
pretty hard on them, but he knew there was one plate 
left; he had seen it when he put out the lamp last 
night. A silver plate, on a small stand. . . . 

He found the plate, but it was empty. 

Poised on one foot, as he had stood to reach 
across, he remained for a moment, struck, his fore- 
head drawn into sudden wrinkles. Conn had the 
quick Celtic mind; he did not waste time arguing 
with himself as to whether he had been mistaken or 
not. He knew he had not been. He knew he had 
seen that silver plate full of tiny Chinese mandarins, 
when he had gone to bed last night, after seeing out 
all his guests, and locking up the patio. In the night 
the fruit had gone. 

Then, he was not alone. 

He drew back his foot, and unconsciously stiff- 
ened himself. Who had managed to elude his lock- 
ing-up precautions; had concealed himself in the 
house all night? With what object? 

Conn thought he could answer that. He was 
used to being spied on. But how had anyone 
guessed today was the day he meant to devote to his 
work? 

Fursey might have guessed. Was he as drunk 
as he had seemed last night? Conn began to think 
he was not. Easily, he might have been feigning or 
exaggerating. Certainly he had had his share of 
wines and liqueurs and whisky, as far as Conn re- 
membered; but Fursey could carry plenty. If he 
was thirsty this morning, the mandarins would be 
attractive, and no one would naturally suppose they 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


79 

would be missed. They would not have been, but 
for the merest chance. 

Still whistling his little tune, Conn left the dining 
room; nor did he forget to take his handful of fruit 
and bread, and to eat it as he went into his room. 
One could eat and think. He sat upon -the cushioned 
box, with his back to the wall, looking about him, 
and finishing up his imported apricots. He threw 
the stones out of the window, trying to hit a green 
and purple parrot that was balancing on a bough. 
A certain gaiety possessed him. Conn was like that 
in danger. It might be that he was going to be assas- 
sinated that morning. Again, it might be not. Cer- 
tainly, the possibility put pepper in the day. 

Something caught his eye; a box of moth-balls ly- 
ing on the ground. They had not been there the day 
before; he could swear to that; he remembered 
emptying the box of a number of silk cushions for 
his dinner party, and putting back the moth-balls 
again with his own hand. He looked into the box. 
It was empty. 

“All the same, I think someone’s been there,” he 
thought. “I’m quite a Sherlock Holmes. Pity I 
can’t find any cigar ashes. Well—” 

The “well” accompanied a visit to a drawer 
where reposed a heavy, well-oiled and cared-for Colt 
revolver. Conn fancied the Colt, had always fancied 
it, no matter what newer make took public fancy. “It 
doesn’t play you tricks,” he said. “And here about 
Meliasi, you don’t want a fancy shooting iron, you 
are liable to need something that’ll blow the inside 
out of a man at two yards or so, without any fuss.” 

He put the revolver in his hip pocket, and stood 
for a moment considering the state of affairs. The 
result was that, with a smile, he took down his broad- 


8o CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


leafed Panama hat, went somewhat noisily across the 
patio, and let himself out with his little Bramah key. 
He locked the gate behind him ; it was not cornmonly 
locked when he was about — but on this occasion, he 
thought best to change his usual plan. 

Once out, he made for the steps that led to the 
beach and the boat, and Meliasi town. The wind, 
warmed by the morning sun, met him over the brow 
of the hill. Far below the harbour, opaline, green 
and blue, glittered wonderfully, like a landscape made 
of Venice glass. Beyond crouched, beastlike, black, 
their hips furred deep with forest, the unknown hills 
where dwelt the New Cumberland cannibals. It 
seemed to Conn, in the sea-wind and the sun, that life 
was a meat of savour. It was good to be very young, 
at the end of the world, in a country full of mystery 
and danger, when other men of his years were feel- 
ing the pulses of sick fools, or jotting in ledgers 
underneath grey office windows, somewhere in the 
cities far south. It was good, very good, to have 
found the golden gate to fortune, before one had 
well begun to look for it. It was a fine thing to be 
a power in this wild country, to influence its little 
politics, lead its more daring spirits, to be rever- 
enced, hated, talked about, plotted against. And to 
be strong. And to enjoy gold mornings and warm 
winds, and nights that tingled with stars — ^yes, to en- 
joy even food and drink, and tobacco, as he enjoyed 
them and enjoyed all things. It came to Conn as 
he went lightfoot down the stairs to the sea beach 
that he was happy. Happy, even in spite of the 
want in his life and home; the want.that had driven 
him into dangerous flirtations with the wives of 
French traders, now and again; that made the 
flowery emptiness of his courtyard and his house 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


8i 


seem — sometimes — no more than a beautified gaol. 
He reckoned he could stand that; it wasn’t the worst 
trouble in the world. To think of people in great 
shops and factories — officers, even, in a man-of-war 
— never alone, always in company, never possessing 
their own souls, — to think of men tied to shrews and 
scolds, badgered daily and nightly. . . . 

Yes, he was happy. It struck him that he had 
never said so, never even consciously thought so, 
before. He had remembered the little silly things 
that didn’t count, and put them before all the big 
ones that did. But there was no doubt about it; 
he had somehow escaped the common doom of man. 
Almost everyone was unhappy save he, Stephen 
Conn, who had managed better than the rest of 
humanity. 

Being favoured of the gods, he would know how 
to deserve their kindness. He would never go about 
saying that the world was a vale of tears and a 
grave, and all that sort of nonsense. He would pro- 
claim it aloud for what it was, a garden of brave 
delights, for brave men to gather. 

“There’s such a thing as being ‘fey,’ ” he thought. 
“Now I wonder am I fey? Perhaps I am. Perhaps 
Fursey is going to get me when I go back again to 
the house.” Conn liked danger ; the thought was 
pungent as cayenne. It added the one touch want- 
ing to his mood of warm content. 

So, with a whistled tune on his lips, the man who 
was one in a million — the man who was happy — 
turned and went up the steps again, it being no part 
of his plan to go to Meliasi that day. And at the 
top of the steps, waiting for him, dark-robed though 
starry-crowned, sat Sorrow. 


82 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


Deirdre, half-frightened, half-delighted with the 
adventure of it all, had been watching from more 
than one hiding place that morning, while the man 
who was, unconsciously, her gaoler, moved from 
room to room. Once she had been nearly caught, 
when she ventured out on the verandah, and had 
to get back, suddenly, with more rustling of draperies 
than was altogether safe. ( But in that tearing trade- 
wind, who could be sure?) Again, her blood had 
checked in her veins, and her breath almost stopped, 
when she saw that he was levelling the muzzle of 
his revolver towards a slight noise that she had un- 
consciously made. What if he pulled the trigger? 
It was as likely as not; there was nothing to pay for 
pulling triggers in Meliasi. Was she going to be 
killed? Should she show herself — give herself up? 
Oh — he had lowered that terrible black muzzle with 
the clump of snake-nosed cartridges behind it, and 
was calmly eating apricots. She hoped he hadn’t 
noticed her thefts in the dining room. She wondered 
why he had made such a breakfast; perhaps he had 
been too drunk the night before to care for anything 
solid. Yet he did not look like that. ... A sudden 
irrational desire for powder — a hairbrush — a clean 
dress — took possession of her. How absurd! No 
one was going to see her, were they? That was the 
last thing she desired — the very last. . . . She won- 
dered if all the pearling crew were like this Fursey. 
. . . Oh — he was going — what luck! If he only 
left the gate open — ^would he? Peep through the 
lace curtain; let’s see — Brute! Locked! 

Deirdre struck her hands, long slender musician’s 
hands, together. It was too bad. Was she never 
going to get out? Would it really be unsafe to dis- 
cover herself? 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 83 

The horrible tales she had heard on the steamer 
came back in a flood. No, no, no! . . . 

There would be some way. People would come 
to see him, and she might make a bolt for it then; 
the gate couldn’t always be locked. Meantime, he 
had clearly gone out for the morning; she had seen 
him disappear over the brow of the cliff. 

Now one could come out. What a lark it all was, 
really. How like some childish game 1 But she was 
hungry; that was no game, hard fact. Well, in' this 
extraordinary man’s house, where there seemed to 
be no servants, and nothing was cleared away or 
washed up, no doubt the dining room would still 
be an oasis in the desert. 

It was, and when one hunted, there was even a 
spirit lamp and a jug of coffee, easily warmed in the 
silver kettle. Deirdre made another of her bivouac 
meals, keeping, meantime, sentry with half her mind, 
and ready, like a mouse, to flee at the slightest sound. 

“I know so exactly how a mouse feels,” she 
thought. “Nibbling, and scuttling, and peering out 
of its hole. . . . When the cat’s away, the mice 
may play. I wonder if I dare?” 

The gleam of a grand piano, dark and shining as 
waters hid in deep forest, drew her irresistibly from 
the open sitting-room door. It was unclosed; the 
long, pied range of keys cried out for touching hands. 
“And I do,” thought Deirdre, craning to see the 
maker’s name — “Yes, it is — I do above all others 
love a Broadstein!” 

The piano stool was just right; no spindly screw 
affair, but a steady four-legged seat with firm 
cushions. “Someone who is pretty tall plays on 
this,” she thought, adjusting an extra cushion. “Now 
— oh, you beauty!” 


84 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

For the Broadstein, caressed by her skilled fingers, 
lifted its voice and sang. The room was lofty, and, 
like all tropical rooms, bare of thick carpeting or 
draperies. The piano liked it; liked her. Deirdre 
had a moment of bliss with a fragment from “Peer 
Gynt” before she remembered herself, and jumped 
up, frightened, to run to the gate, look out between 
the bars and listen. Had there been a sound some- 
where outside ? 

No — nonsense. There was no sound or sign of 
anyone. And now she thought of it, one could not 
have heard any ordinary light sound over the notes 
of the piano. It was clearly her own fancy. She 
was safe. She would go back, and try what she had 
been longing to try ever since last night — the new 
verse to her song. 

It began, the song as all the world knew it, with 
two soft chords like a sigh. Then — 

*‘Your shadow on the wall. 

Your pictured eyes to watch the live-long day, 

Your lips, your longing lips that seem to say — 

‘One kiss, beloved, deep in dreams tonight. 

One long embrace, ere cruel morning light 

Wake you to know that dreams, our dreams are all. 

That cold we clasp, and shadowlike we kiss. 

That all eur loves and hopes are only this — 

A shadow on the wall.’ 

“ ‘Your shadow on my heart 
Your shade that falls between me and the sun. 

That holds me, until all my days are done. 

In the dark valleys where no blossoms grow. 

But lilies, cloistered lilies, cold as snow. 

From love’s red roses evermore apart. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 85 

I bind them to my breast, I hold them fast, 

Ah, Love, I hold, till all my days are past. 

Close, close I hold, though tears, though blood drops 
start, 

Your shadow on my heart/ 

She sang it through, with her little, golden voice, 
and paused for a moment, her hands upon the keys. 
Shaw — ^Adrian Shaw — she had not felt that about 
him. She had only thought she felt it. 

Yet one might feel it, for another man — someone 
whom one could imagine, whom one had never 
known. A wind from the cold valleys where mis- 
fortune dwells blew over the girl ; she shuddered. 

“God keep me from knowing such a man,” she 
said. She struck the keys with the grand sweep that 
ushered in the new, last verse. 

“Your shadow on my heart. . . . 

0 Love, look up with me, and see at last. 

When our long agony is overpast. 

In rainbow rays the clouds afar shall roll. 

Leaving your light. Love's light, the light of Heaven, 
For ever in my soul !” 


Deirdre, artist-fashion, had forgotten herself, for- 
gotten where she was, and what risks she ran. She 
let the splendid Broadstein have its will. Up to the 
ceiling, and round the high frieze of the room, out 
across the patio, mingling with the song of the foun- 
tain, and raising on the wings of the trade-wind, went 
her music. She ended. The glory of the notes was 
on her like a glory from the heaven of which she 
wrote. Vibrating with tone and with emotion, she 


86 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


leaned her head on the piano, and tears came — not 
for Adrian Shaw, forgotten and married long ago, 
but for some sorrow that seemed nameless, bitter, 
world-wide, and that yet, in some strange fashion, 
was hers. 

Then, behind her, in a man’s voice, came suddenly 
the last phrase of her song, sung far better than she, 
with her small sweet voice, could sing it — 

“Your light, Lovers light, the light of Heaven, 

For ever in my soul!” 

Deirdre turned and sprang like a shot hare. Fac- 
ing her stood the man whom she had watched in 
secret, from whom, half-heartedly, she had fled. 
“You are Deirdre!” he said to her. 

“And you,” she answered him breathlessly, “are 
not Furseyl” 

Fursey I Not by a long shot,” he said, showing 
a good set of teeth in an honest laugh. “Furseyl 
Now what made you think so? And why — Well, 
I m not asking that; no whys at all. Don’t tell me; 
I d rather not know. You’re not true; you’re some- 
thing out of a nursery fairy tale. You’ve been eating 
in my little plate, and drinking out of my little cup, 
and sleeping in my little bed — ” 

“Oh, no, I didn’t,” broke in Deirdre, “I was 
afraid. I slept underneath it 1” 

“Where, in goodness name?” asked the man 
through a shout of laughter. 

Across the patio. The room with the big 
mirror — ” 

Naturally!” He had the brightest of grey eyes; 
they were steady, and held hers even in the midst 
of his laughing. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 87 


She began to explain. 

“No, don’t,” he begged, pulling a chair behind 
her, and when she took it, sitting down himself upon 
the piano stool. “As soon as you explain, you’ll not 
be a fairy story any more, and you’ll want to go. 
Give me that new verse of yours again, the modula- 
tion’s better. Play the accompaniment — here, 
change with me. I know the air, but I must have 
those chords. This it?” He leaned over her and 
touched the keys. 

“No, no,” corrected the composer. “Very nearly, 
but — Here, play the sharp; don’t you see you shift 
into the major?” 

“Right; I’m an ass. Heaven’s always major; one 
ought to know that. ‘For ever in my soul.’ Good. 
You ought to have written it that way at first; why 
didn’t you?” 

“I don’t know.” She suddenly felt that she did 
know ; if she only stopped to think, but that she would 
not stop to think. She would not tell herself, or 
him, whence those clanging, crying chords, that 
mounting sadness and glory, had taken birth, last 
night. 

“I must go,” she broke in, rising to her feet. 
“You really must let me explain — ” 

“Explain,” he said, turning round from the piano, 
with his hands still on the keys, and keeping up a 
little undercurrent of sound. He was polite now; 
a grave gentleman, not a boy. 

Deirdre told her story, briefly and somewhat un- 
steadily. The strain of the night was beginning to 
make its mark. 

“Well,” he said, his fingers rippling sadly along 
the keys, “the fairy tale’s over; of course you won’t 
stay. Will you?” He was quite serious. 


88 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“No, thank you,” said Delrdre, wondering all the 
while if he were mad, or she. “I — I’d like — to get 
my trunk,” she added. “It has been in the bushes 
all night” 

“My boys,” said the man, “will be back almost 
at once; I hoisted the signal for them. You’ll have 
time to tidy In my room, if you want to. Your hat’s 
on quite straight (for she had replaced it) and your 
hands are clean, and you don’t need any powder 
at all, but you can take some out of my shaving kit. 
My room’s — ” 

“I know,” she said. “I was in the box.” 

“You were ?” he said. It seemed he was not given 
to showing surprise, even when he felt it. “Last 
night?” 

“Yes — ^tlll you went out.” 

“I hope Fursey was not — ” He was self-pos- 
sessed certainly, but she detected a grain of anxiety 
in his eye. 

“If he was,” she answered directly, “I didn’t hear 
him.” 

“Ah, well, I can tell you. It’s lucky for you, since 
you were out for hitting wrong islands, that you did 
not hit his.” 

“You haven’t told me what this one is yet,” stated 
Delrdre, pausing in the doorway. 

“This is Wawa.” 

“I know that. I thought Wawa was — I forget 
what. No one could remember those names.” 

“They aren’t easy. But my name is Conn, and 
I’m a fairly respectable resident. The Mission island 
isn’t far away. My boys will take you in the boat.” 
She wondered how he had guessed, that after all the 
events of the night, she would rather he did not 
escort her himself. She felt suddenly very tired. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 89 


In Conn’s room, she gave a few feminine touches at 
the glass, thinking she looked white. The last new 
verse of her song kept crying in her mind. 

“God keep me from knowing such a man,” she 
said. Outside, she could hear the boat’s crew, sum- 
moned by signal, running into the yard. 


CHAPTER VI 


U NTIL the last echo of the New Cumberland 
natives’ singing died down over the brow of 
the hill, Conn the Hundred Fighter stood on his 
courtyard steps. A few minutes longer he waited; 
then he climbed to the little peak that rose above the 
house, and watched, from his eagle-eyrie, the boat 
creeping many-legged and swift, like some strange 
water insect, over the sea to Waka. There was no 
mistake this time. He had not thought there would 
be, else no intuition of Deirdre’s overwrought long- 
ing for solitude had kept him from accompanying 
her. But Conn’s boys were not in the habit of mak- 
ing mistakes; they had too much respect for that 
chilled-steel temper of his, and for the terrible sting- 
ray tail that hung in his room. There is no more 
frightful instrument of punishment in the world than 
the long, whalebone-like, spike-strewn tail of the 
giant stingaree; and in the New Cumberlands, in the 
days of which I tell, more than one native had met 
his death by it. Conn was no mere brute, no Legree, 
in his dealings with the practically enslaved cannibals 
who worked his boat and his house for him, but no- 
body had ever accused him of being an indulgent 
master. The coxswain of the boat had been given 
quite plainly to understand that any mistake in con- 
veying the White Chieftainess safely to the Mission 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


91 

would mean an hour of reckoning that would leave 
him too sick to work for a week. 

So Conn was as sure as one may be sure of any- 
thing in this world that Deirdre would be safely 
landed. Nevertheless, he stood on the peak of the 
island, watching through a fine pair of binoculars, 
till the boat, small as an ant, crawled to rest by the 
thread-like Mission pier; till two little pale dots 
crept down the shore to meet it, and three little pale 
dots returned all together; till the little pale dots, 
all merged in one now, melted away under the 
shadow of the tiny, black and white flecked domino 
that was the Mission house. Then he lowered his 
glass, and returned. The gate of the patio clanged 
shut behind him. He stood alone under the pillars 
of the verandah, listening and looking; he walked 
through every room, and — ^this time — looked in 
boxes and under beds, a half smile flickering on his 
hard young cheek as he did so. 

“I was getting damned careless,” he said to him- 
self. “It wanted something to wake me up.” 

There was no one in the unused rooms; no one 
hiding in chests or behind mosquito nets. Conn’s 
own footsteps made the only sound, his breathing 
the only life, in the still house. It came upon him 
with a sudden rush how lonely it was — how terribly 
lonely his life. In the act of singling a certain key, 
small and curiously shaped, from a bunch attached to 
his watch chain, he paused, stared, and stood motion- 
less for quite a while. 

Then he shook himself back to life. “Dreaming, 
you beggar,” he said. “No dreaming. No dream- 
ing, no loafing. Less whisky, if you please, as well. 
You’re nearer the edge than I like.” 

For he knew, as none but dwellers in the lonely 


92 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


lands do know, what dangers wait upon the self- 
indulgent, there, where a man has only himself to 
depend upon; only his own small thread of character 
and pluck to bridge him across gulfs that lead to 
madness, and to the slow mind-rotting that is com- 
moner, but not less terrible. He had seen the trail- 
ing step, the staring eye, the hands that had lost 
all grip and skill, the death-in-llfe of men who had 
once been as gods In their strength and pride. He 
had seen them lie all day on their island mats, facing 
the sea, and staring hypnotized at the breaking 
waves; fed by natives on native food; clothed scarce 
at all, not thinking or reading ever, but smoking, 
drinking — not always drinking; there were more 
subtle causes of downfall than the bottle or the kava 
bowl — ^but always, always. Idly, endlessly, dream- 
ing. ... 

He shuddered, as does a thin-skinned horse when 
touched by a poisonous fly. 

“Not for mine,” said Conn of the Hundred 
Fights. He stood once more, for a tense moment, 
listening and looking, and then entered a room that 
looked like an ordinary business office. It was lit 
by a skylight and It had a leather-covered, sloping 
desk, some large account books, a copying press, a 
typewriter, and in one corner, standing on the floor, 
a steel safe of the latest burglar-proof pattern.- 
Carefully working the combination, he opened it. 
There were documents on the shelves, a cash box, 
and a small tray full of gold nuggets, neatly sorted 
according to size. In the lower part. It held a pell- 
mell of trade goods samples, such as natives delight 
in; strings of beads, large and small, combs, looking 
glasses, belts of many coloured stuffs. All these were 
marked with prices and figures; It seemed that Conn 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


93 


kept memoranda of his profits in dealing with the 
native tribes, and had reasons of his own for keep- 
ing those profits secret. 

Once more he listened and looked about him, 
and then took out of the safe a few strings of 
the beads, and two belts, made of velvet — one 
deep blue, and one creamy yellow. He smoothed 
them out on a small flat table that stood under 
the skylight, and contemplated them with interest. 
‘T think the yellow is a bit off in colour,’* he said 
to himself; and then, “Talking aloud, you beggar; 
haven’t I told you about that before?” In silence 
he held up the two pieces of stuff, and compared 
them. In silence he reached for a string of the blue 
beads. . . . 

“Damn the bell!” he barked. Outside, at the 
patio gate, a bell was jangling furiously. 

“Ring away,” Conn silently adjured the inter- 
rupter. The interrupter, as if he had heard, did ring 
away. Jing-jing-jang went the bell. Jang-jangle- 
jang. Tang-tankle, tang-tankle. Jang! 

“Broken,” thought Conn, as the sound ceased 
abruptly. “Now perhaps you’ll go away.” 

But the persistent visitor did not go away. In- 
stead, he began a steady rattling on the gate. It 
sounded as if he had picked up a stone, and was 
battering the iron-work. 

Now Conn had had the iron-work newly painted, 
only a week before, and in the islands paint is paint. 
With a brief stinging aspiration as to the caller’s 
future fate, he flung his trade goods into the safe, 
lo^ed it, locked the door of the room, and came 
out into the patio. 

“Confound you. Gatehouse,” he said, “you must 
have taken off a yard of my paint. What do you 


94 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


want, and why must you batter the house down? 
You’ve smashed the bell, too.” 

He was unlocking as he spoke. The Secretary, 
standing outside in the fierce New Cumberland sun, 
looked at him with inexpressive black-glassy eyes, 
from under the deep brim of his pith helmet, before 
he spoke. It was a trick he had; his words seemed 
always a little slow in making their way to the 
surface. 

When he did speak, it was to the purpose. 

“The Commissioner sent me to see if the lady 
passenger from the steamer is here. She’s lost.” . 

“Come inside,” said Conn. He did not love Gate- 
house, but he was always hospitable. “Have a 
drink. Sit down. No, she’s not here. What on 
earth made you think she was?” 

“The Commissioner was informed,” said Gate- 
house, “that she was seen leaving the ship in a canoe 
just before dusk, but that the Mission people had 
seen nothing of her. We’ve sent to Fursey’s island” 
— he had all the Secretary’s mannerisms. Conn 
noted; he always spoke, when possible, in the plural 
— “but couldn’t find any trace, and some of the boys 
thought she might be here.” 

Conn bustled about among his glasses and de- 
canters, back turned. He had to think quickly. 
Meliasi was no strait-laced spot, but that very fact 
made it certain that Deirdre’s innocent adventure 
might have an ugly colour put on it. . . . 

He turned round again. 

“Say when,” he remarked. “I can tell you just 
where she is, and that’s at the Mission. She bor- 
rowed my boat early this morning, and went over 
in it, and I saw her land.” 

“Oh,” commented Gatehouse, in a tone that 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


95 


sounded as if it ought to go with a single eyeglass. 
Then — “But where did she get to? The Commis- 
sioner’ll want to know.” 

Conn did some more rapid thinking. 

“She seems to have been wandering all over the 
harbour in that dashed canoe they put her into,” 
was his reply. “I’m going to have a talk with the 
mate when the ‘Tyre’ returns.” 

Gatehouse swallowed a mouthful or two, and set 
down his glass. He did not speak for some time. 
Conn was resolved that he would not speak either. 
Least said, soonest mended. 

“We should like to be satisfied where she was,” 
was what Gatehouse brought up at last from the 
depths of his consciousness. 

“Didn’t I tell you where she was?” 

“Was she here ? They may make a sort of official 
matter of it, you know. It seemed she’d letters to 
the Commissioner.” 

Conn did not see, under the circumstances, that 
he was bound to lie. He gave the Secretary a brief 
resume of the facts. 

Gatehouse did not seem particularly interested. 
He made a note or two, and said he’d inform the 
Commissioner, and “we” would see she was looked 
after during the rest of her stay. “The beggar’s 
made of starch and red tape,” thought Conn. “Hang 
it, he never even asked what she’s like, and she’s 
as pretty as Billy-be-dam.” His young man’s pride 
in a romantic adventure with a pretty woman felt 
lowered. 

It was for this reason that he nailed the departing 
subject down and informed the Secretary, without 
being asked, that the girl had a jolly name ; suited 
her, too, because she was a no-end jolly girl. 


96 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

“Delrdre,” he said, “Deirdre. Pretty, isn’t it? 
She writes songs — those well-known songs. Every- 
one sings them. She’s Irish — Antrim. (For so 

Deirdre told him, while waiting for the boat.) I’m 
Kerry myself, but I like the Black North. ‘Dark 
and true and tender’ — ^you know. Miss Rogers — ” 
“Miss WHAT?” 

Gatehouse was awake now. His black-glassy eyes 
had turned to flame; there was colour in his cold 
face. “What did you say her name was?” he de- 
manded. 

“Rogers.” 

Gatehouse became silent again, and looked at him 
with a drawing-out expression. The traders and 
planters who came to see the Commissioner on 
various sorts of business generally told all they 
knew — and often more than they knew they told — 
when the Secretary treated them to that knowing, 
sympathetic silence of his. But Conn was of another 
clay. 

“No, you don’t,” he said to himself. “You seem 
to have heard something about her, but you’ll learn 
no more than you know from me.” And he busied 
himself filling up the Secretary’s glass. 

“No more,” objected Gatehouse hurriedly. “Too 
early in the morning.” And then, because he had 
been hustled into speech after all — “About what age 
is she?” 

The devil entered into Conn. 

“Not a day over eight-and-thirty,” he said with 
emphasis, as if he were trying to persuade himself. 
“And very well preserved. Plenty to say for her- 
self. Can look after herself jolly well, my word! 
Regular globe-trotter, she is. Seen everything, been 
everywhere. Think you know her?” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


97 


He chuckled to himself. The words were so true, 
the impression they all in all conveyed, so false! 
Conn was not above a falsehood of that description 
in a good cause. His Celtic wiliness rather en- 
joyed it. 

Something primitive, furious, male, seemed to die 
out of Gatehouse’s face as he spoke. It became, 
once more, the steady, inexpressive countenance of 
the Secretary. Conn had seen; he was more than a 
little puzzled. If Gatehouse knew this charming 
little Deirdre — who was not, he would swear, nearly 
up to her thirtieth year — why didn’t he know her 
age? And if he did not know her, why look at a 
man who — well, a man who had behaved exceed- 
ingly well, by Jupiter! — ^with that pistols-for-two- 
and-cofFee-for-one expression of a minute ago? 

It struck Conn — not quite for the first time — ^that 
the Secretary was a man to be counted with. Per- 
haps more so, after all, than bluff British Blackbury. 
What nationality was Gatehouse, by the way? The 
name seemed English, but — 

“Have a cigar before you go,” he suggested. 
Conn’s cigars were famous in Meliasi. No one else 
could afford such smokes. The Secretary sat down 
again. 

“Are you Irish?” bounced out Conn. He was 
sure that he could tell by Gatehouse’s way^ of ac- 
cepting or denying the suggestion. No one is indif- 
ferent to the charge of Celtic blood; it is proudly 
accepted, or fiercely denied, as the case may be. 

“Not I,” was Gatehouse’s slightly contemptuous 
answer. “Welsh descent.” 

“Not a Welsh name.” 

“No. My father took my mother’s.” 

That was true, thought Conn. “Ever been in 


98 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


Ireland?” he ventured, nipping his cigar. Gate- 
house seemed too much occupied with the matches 
to reply. They certainly were damp; the weather 
had been rainy. . . . 

“By the way,” he said, when his cigar was alight, 
“you are descended from the Kings of Ireland your- 
self, aren’t you?” 

“My dear fellow,” was Conn’s reply, “have you 
ever read Thackeray?” 

“Pretty well all,” answered the Secretary. 

“Then you won’t want to know why I prefer not 
to make any such claims. Every grocer in Sandy- 
mount or Kingstown Is descended from Brian Boru.” 

“But you are royal blood?” Insisted Gatehouse. 
It seemed to Interest him. 

“I can only say our pedigree is a jolly sight better 
authenticated than most. Names and places, you 
know. And old curios. And the land my grand- 
uncle holds near Tara — yes. It’s a good claim. 
What do you want to know for? No man on earth 
is really Interested in any other man’s pedigree, or 
believes in it. That’s an axiom.” 

“I wish to God I was royal,” said Gatehouse in 
a sudden burst. Then he began to laugh. “Good 
joke,” he said. “You thought I meant It.” He 
became silent, and finished his cigar without another 
word. When it was done, he rose to say good-bye. 

“But you did mean It,” thought Conn, as«he shut 
the gate. “I wonder, by any chance. If I am going 
mad? The things that have happened In this last 
twenty-four hours make one feel jolly like it.” 

He took out the little Bramah key again, went 
into his office, and began turning over the strings 
of trade beads. Presently he took a tiny case of 
tools from an upper shelf of the safe. Under the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


99 


skylight, head bent down, he worked for a long 
time. The sun, striking directly down upon his head, 
warned him of the time of day. He got up, stretched 
himself, locked everything away, and went to open 
the gate. Outside it stood, yawning and bored, his 
boat’s crew and his three cooky boys. 

“You leavem that fellow Mary all right along 
Mission?” he demanded. 

“Me leavem,” answered the coxswain, a bison- 
faced, hairy brute with a boar’s tusk thrust through 
his nose. 

“Suppose you no talk true along me, bime-by I cut 
out altogether soul belong you, belt you along hell.” 

“Me leavem, true,” repeated the cannibal, 
trembling. 

“Then go and get your kai-kai, and you cookies go 
and get kai-kai belong me.” 

He went back into the house. There was nothing 
more to do for the day; nothing to look forward 
to but meals, as if one had been a ship-wrecked 
sailor — as if one had been a man in gaol. What 
else was he, it occurred to Conn the Hundred 
Fighter. What else was this fine, empty house of his 
but a gaol for himself and his solitary thoughts? It 
was reeking with loneliness, it smelt of it; loneliness 
gathered in dark corners as a poisonous fog; loneli- 
ness sat on the lintel of the door, like a taloned crow, 
ready to set its claws in him as he came in. . . . 

Food was cooked, eaten, and cleared away. The 
noises of the kitchen ceased; it was afternoon. On 
the pale concrete of the patio shadows began to 
lengthen and grow blue. The day was almost gone, 
and Conn, who in the morning, had run up the island 
stairs, light-hearted with life and happiness, knew, 
with the sinking sun, that he was — unhappy. 


CHAPTER VII 


I N Meliasi, in the New Cumberlands, about the 
wild Western Pacific generally, one may safely 
assume concerning any settlement, without seeing 
it, that its inhabitants resemble the over-advertised 
little girl with the curl, in that — 

“When they are good, they are very, very good. 

And when they are bad, they are horrid.” 

There are few greys, few half lights or shadows 
in the Western Islands. We of Melanesia are one 
thing or the other, with emphasis. We may be mis- 
sionaries dripping with piety, as a roast goose drips 
with fat; we may be beachcombers living ungodly 
lives in the midst of native ladies and exotic drinks ; 
we may be Government officials composed of starch 
and red tape, or wild recruiters of the black-birding 
breed, ready to row a whaleboat-and-twelve through 
any native protection act ever passed. We are 
seldom, very seldom, just commonplace, fairly re- 
spectable folk. If we had been, we should have 
stayed among the tram-lines and picture-shows, two 
thousand miles away. . . . 

Conn, as a white Melanesian, knew all this. 
Conn, passing through the one street of the capital, 
with his long loping gait that spoke of hard tramps 
and many, thought on various subjects. Conn, on 
100 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS loi 


the whole, was inclined to feel like the player in a 
Rugby match who gets^ hold of the ball, and flings 
himself on it to keep it. The player’s opponents 
are twenty-nine to one, and they mean to have that 
ball. . . . 

His opponents, here in Melanesia, were a hundred 
to one; the ball was his secret, and they meant to 
have him off it. If he did not come off, he would 
be kicked off, sooner or later. 

On the whole he wondered that he had been 
allowed to keep it so long. Public opinion, he knew, 
was getting up to boiling point. Nobody was rich 
in the New Cumberlands. Plantations, in spite of 
labour that was practically slave labour, seldom paid 
well. Trading brought big returns, but the traders 
did not often live to enjoy them; there were not, 
in the New Cumberlands all told, more traders 
existent at any one time than there were men on the 
celebrated “Dead man’s chest,” and for the same 
reason — 

''Drink and the devil had done for the rest.” 

Everybody had half a dozen ways of making a 
fortune, but nobody’s way ever came to anything — 
except Conn’s — nobody, at the end of years of 
struggle with companies that would not float, stores 
that went “broke,” mines that turned out nothing but 
calls to shareholders, ever, ever, ever attained the 
Manoa, the visionary golden land. 

Except Conn. 

The French millet planter’s wife and child could 
not afford to go to Sydney for a change. The Anglo- 
Baptist Mission had holes in its chapel roof. The 
double-verandahed house at the end of the street 
didn’t see even tinned meat on the table, some days, 


102 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


that were not fast days of any church. Des Roseaux 
drank red-ink claret; Blackbury’s house had streaky 
unwashed floors because he could not keep more 
than a couple of boys. The tale was the same all 
through Meliasi. And Conn, Conn who had conie 
up there six years before a mere lad fresh from his 
University, and had started a little plantation like 
all the rest — Conn, whose plantation was running 
wild in the bush, whose labour force was disbanded, 
who didn’t raise a nut, or sell a cartridge or a scrap 
of cotton; Conn, who like the lilies of the field, toiled 
not, neither spinned — Conn was rich ! 

And any one of them might be as rich as he was, 
if they only knew what he knew. And he wouldn’t 
tell, and he couldn’t be entrapped. Meliasi, as he 
walked through it that afternoon, looked at him 
much as the chorus of villains looks at the hero in 
a Verdi opera, and in much the same way, told itself 
that “a time would come. . . .” 

Out of the swinging trade-wind, it was hot, down 
there. Shadows lay like mantles of black fur, on 
the glaring .coral sand of the roadway. The iron 
shanties that stood for stores, homes, hotels, fairly 
spat heat at you as you passed, from their unpainted 
walls, too hot to put the hand on. The flat sea 
dazzled like an open furnace door. Conn, imper- 
vious to heat, slung along. He was wanted up at 
the Commissioner’s; the message had come by one 
of Blackbury’s boys, and, understanding very well 
what it meant, he had stopped off at the township, 
to make a purchase or two, before going on to the 
Residency island. 

There were more than Conn who guessed at the 
meaning of the message, when the uniformed boy, 
in his Fiji-pattern vandyked loin-cloth, went past. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 103 

Three or four men running up the harbour In a 
lugger with a boom proportioned to the hull as a 
grasshopper’s huge leg Is proportioned to Its trifling 
body, saw Blackbury’s messenger paddle across to 
Wawa; saw Conn return with him; saw the white 
man go into a store and leave an order, and then 
go back across the narrow strait to the overhanging 
islet whereon the Residency was built. 

They looked at each other and laughed. The 
man with the tiller, who seemed to be in command 
of the boat and the party generally, said something 
to his neighbour, and changed the course, heading 
for the pier. 

“No shelling today,” said the steersman. “Some- 
thing better to do than fishing jobs,” agreed a loose- 
limbed fellow, loafing In the stern. 

“Come with me, and I will make you fishers of 
men,” quoted the steersman blasphemously. The 
others roared. 

Under full sail. In the streaming of the strong 
south-east, the lugger leaned and flew. Fursey, 
handling her as a master of sail, drove her up to 
the jetty, foam flying, canvas booming, as If he would 
have smashed her Into the piles. The native crew 
stood ready, and at Fursey’s shout, swung the lugger 
Into the wind so smartly that she drew up alongside 
like a motor car stopping at a doorway. 

“Where to?” asked the loose-limbed man, as they 
stepped ashore. 

Fursey looked up at him. It was. a long way to 
look; he was scarcely five feet four In height; a 
pocket Hercules sort of a man, wItK shoulders dis- 
proportionately broad, and the loose-limbed man 
was nearly six feet five. Yet you rnight have betted, 
with safety, on Fursey’s chances. In the event of a 


104 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


fight. Big men are seldom overcharged with life 
and the fury of life, as small ones sometimes are. 
There was the dynamic force of three in the little 
fellow who strutted by the big man’s side. His eyes 
showed it, fierce brown, full of sparkles, and set low 
beneath eyebrows as straight and heavy as a char- 
coal stick. His mouth, sealing-wax red, under its 
pointed, curling moustache, was greedy and eager; 
charged, at the same time, with a certain furious 
capability and force; the mouth of a leader. His 
nose was crooked; one ear, bent in on itself and 
notched, looked as if it had been chewed by an angry 
dog. He walked in a jumpy, tittupping style, as if 
it would take little to make him ‘break into a dance. 
You felt, on looking at him, that he was a man 
who might ^be, as circumstances chanced, something 
rather fine, or something extremely vile ; that he was 
dangerous — if he was — not so much because -of any 
innate -bent towards evil, as ‘because he had never 
denied, and never so long as he lived and •breathed, 
would deny. Jack Fursey anything that Jack Fursey 
wanted. 

He answered the other man after a second or 
two, meant to show his authority. 

“You can go and wait for me at the banyan. I’ll 
see what stores have been bought. It might be our 
chance this time.” 

“Reilly says,” put in another man, “that there’s 
talk of calling a meeting of all the citizens, French 
and English, and demanding Conn should disclose, 
for the good of the country.” 

“A fat lot he would mind the good of the country. 
Would you?” 

“Maybe I would, if they threatened to boycott 
me at the stores and everywhere else.” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 105 

‘‘Maybe you would,” said Fursey, strutting head 
up, ‘‘but maybe no one else but a born fool would. 
S’ long as a man has a few cartridges he don’t de- 
pend altogether on stores. He could always make 
the nigs hand over. Conn could hold out. That’s 
not the way. Maybe Jack can show you a better 
trick than that.” 

He had a habit of speaking of himself as “Jack,” 
oddly egotistical in effect. The other men looked 
at him and laughed. 

“A nice Sunday-school sort of way. Parson, I 
hope,” said one of them. 

Fursey, who had actually, at one time of his life, 
studied for the ministry somewhere — no one knew 
what ministry, or where — was known, among other 
less reputable nicknames, as the “Parson.” It was 
inappropriate enough to enrapture his very un- 
parsonic associates ; and it gave an extra flavour to 
the astonishing bursts of profanity that were their 
envy and delight. 

“You can let me alone for that,” was the answer. 
“Child,” to the tall man, “we’ll want to know what 
stores he got; cut and see. And send Maraki up 
to the Commissioner’s, one-time; savvy?” 

“I savvy,” said the big fellow, “Maraki’s worth 
his weight in gold.” 

“Don’t be seen talking to him,” warned Fursey, 
“or you make him useless.” 

“He’ll be at his house in the native camp. No 
white men there. Where’ll he meet you?” 

“Under the banyan. Come there yourself. Smith 
and Mac, you might just as well stay with the boat. 
We’ll be going back in no time.” 

The long-legged Child melted away;^ he never 
seemed to walk like other people, but to slip or glide. 


io6 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


So does the island cannibal move. It is possible 
that Child — of whom strange things were told on 
lone south-windy evenings, under verandah roofs — 
had acquired the habit during the periods he had 
spent alone among the native tribes, on far-out, 
almost never visited islands. 

The other pearling men were a trifle shy of him ; 
no one knew quite why. Fursey, whom nothing 
shocked, nothing daunted, made a special friend of 
him. 

It was not far to the banyan tree, though the latter 
was in the midst of untouched, tropic forest. 
Meliasi, in those comparatively recent times, looked, 
as it stood on the white beach, with the white foam- 
ing reef in front of it, like a group of frightened 
houses that had just rushed out of the forest, to make 
a stand upon the open shore, against some wild-wood 
dragon that ate up little tin shanties and crunched 
their bones. You could have thrown a stone from 
the main street into the bush. And into the bush, 
near as it was to the row of bungalows, stores, 
saloons, shell and copra warehouses, no one — almost 
— ever went. Why should they? The road to the 
back country went not through the bush, but, along 
the open shore. There was nothing at all in the 
great forest that anybody could want, and there 
might be things nobody wanted — a dum-dum’d bullet 
from a New Cumberland native’s gun; a poisoned 
arrow perhaps ; plenty of snakes, to a certainty. . . . 

Fursey, leaving Smith, who was just a Smith, and 
the red-haired Mac, to go back to the jetty, followed 
the beach road himself until a turn took it out of 
sight of the township, when he dodged off it right 
into the dense forest, pressing aside a mass of thick 
growing boughs to do so. Behind the boughs lay 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 107 

a track, narrow but neatly cut, and kept always open. 
Fursey, in this, had adopted a New Cumberland na- 
tive custom which seemed good to him. The can- 
nibal of these western islands usually masks his roads 
as far as possible, cutting them clear through the 
bush until the last few yards, when he stays his 
knife and tomahawk and leaves a few yards of grow- 
ing underbush between the track and the open. 

Fursey, with his dancing step, went along the 
track, whistling as he went. He whistled native 
fashion, notes without a tune. No need to advertise 
oneself. But whistle he felt he must. He was, in his 
own terms, “feeling good” that day. If you or any- 
one else had come along and asked him to do you 
a good turn — to lend you money; to subscribe to 
your pet charity; to put you up for a week — Fursey 
would certainly have done it. The prospect he had 
glimpsed of robbing Conn successfully at last was 
so pleasing that one thinks he would even have gone 
to church, if one of Meliasi’s numerous missionaries 
had asked him just at that point — ^would have sung 
in the hymns, and put money in the plate as well. 
But, indeed, to do him justice, Fursey was prepared, 
as a rule, to be good-natured and obliging, so long 
as it did not inconvenience him in any way. Just 
like you, or like me. . . . 

The banyan, in the heart of the deep bush that 
stretched behind Meliasi, was a forest in a forest. 
It might have covered a couple of acres. It had 
more columns than a cathedral, more dark tattered 
flags drooping in its windless calm than any nave 
under European skies. In among the columns, 
among the stalactites of aerial root that had not 
yet touched earth, wound countless little tracks; pig 
tracks, bandicoot and wallaby tracks, tracks of the 


io8 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


splay-footed, man-long iguana. All the strange small 
peoples of the bush, the “little brothers and sisters,’’ 
knew of the banyan tree-forest, made their homes in 
it, and hunted their food among its silent shadowy 
colonnades. Men did not come there — often. The 
little brothers felt safe, most days, from those big, 
ruthless relatives who tramped so hard and high, and 
carried such cruel, far-reaching claws of their own. 
Such folk could not come along the slender bandicoot 
and iguana roads; they had a road of their own, 
cut winding in and out through the maze of the 
columned stems, right to the heart of all, where the 
mother trunk, from which the whole wide forest had 
started, stood crumbling away to ruin in the midst 
of her thousand children. 

There was a rough seat or two, made by felling 
the nearer stems. And at the seats, the beauty of 
the forest broke off. For there were bottles there, 
empty bottles strewn in dozens about the ground, 
and there were bits of newspapers, and handfulls 
of spent matches, and banana skins, and mango 
kernels, covered with blue mould. It was the chosen 
retreat of Fursey and his crowd, when they came 
over to Meliasi, and it bore the marks of their 
passing. 

Fursey, waiting for Child and the native, sat 
astride one of the logs, still whistling. His soft felt 
hat was drawn, as usual, half over one eye ; his waist, 
springy and tough as a slim hibiscus tree, was sashed 
round with a crimson handkerchief. Another hung 
loosely about his neck. He had a knife on one hip, 
and a Smith and Wesson in a leather sheath, dangling 
from the other. Fursey was practically two-handed, 
and prided himself on it not a little. He read 
American desperado fiction, and modelled himself 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 109 

on the costumes and demeanour of its “bad men.** 
People who did not understand the little auto- 
crat of Wakaka Island, thought him a consummate 
joke. 

Maraki, coming soundlessly through the bush, and 
looking at his chief as he came, thought nothing of 
the kind. The New Cumberland native — a. clever 
fellow for his race — understood just the kind of 
loaded pinfire cartridge that Fursey was, and 
handled him accordingly. It would never have sur- 
prised Maraki if Fursey, in a fit of half-humourous 
caprice, had snatched out that barking little gun, 
and shot him dead. Therefore Maraki, gliding 
through the bush with no more noise than any other 
shadow stirred by passing beast or bird, kept his 
old Brown Bess musket upon his shoulder, with the 
muzzle covering the chest of the white man. 

Farther off than any other white man would have 
heard him, the pearler did, and greeted him with 
a sort of whale-spout of swearing, mostly good- 
humoured. Maraki, standing at a respectful dis- 
tance, waited till the spout had rushed up, flickered, 
and gone down again. Then he spoke. 

“Me hearem.’* 

“You hearem, eh? Hearem Blackbury, hearem 
Conn?’* 

“E! Hearem altogether, me-fellow. Me-fellow 
go all same lat (rat) under house, hearem Belakiburi 
talk along Conni. Belakiburi him say — ‘Too much 
dam row New Cumberlan* boy makem along Koro. 
White man one he killem’ — *’ 

“That would be Green,” commented Fursey, un- 
moved, to Child, who had just come up. “I always 
said they’d get him if he wouldn’t take the trouble 
of shifting his bed every night. Lazy beggar. Green. 


no CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


I don’t take any stock in laziness. Specially for a 
trader in these parts. He’s got to keep his eyes 
skinned, and his wits on the jump. Well?” 

“He told me,” put in Child, “he says, as far^ as 
I can make out, that Blackbury’s made up his mind 
to try a punitive expedition. Probably chance what 
the Colonial Office will say. I reckon he won’t tell 
them much, anyhow. He wants Conn to come along 
and back him up; seems he has an unflattering sort 
of opinion of the rest of the town, and said so; 
even the nigger took it. Conn knew all about it 
before he was sent for. Must have meant to go 
out himself. Bought stores for three or four days. 
I reckon Blackbury aims to keep him from jumping 
his job too much, as well as getting help from him.” 

“Are they off yet?” 

“Getting the whaleboat out, and loading her, 
when I left. Be round the point by now.” 

“Then this,” said Fursey, rising to his feet, and 
doing a step or two of a coon shuffle dance, “this is 
the best chance we’re going to get.” 

“You make me tired,” came in Child’s odd, life- 
less voice. He looked down at Fursey from his 
towering height. He seemed not half awake, and 
yet somehow formidable, as a dozing snake is for- 
midable. “Why should you think Conn- will go off 
and leave things open for you and me to run 
through?” 

“You make me tired with your damn think, think, 
thinking. I don’t think. I know. I take chances. 
There’s one now. If there isn’t — ” He said what 
would happen to himself and other people, if there 
was not. He used the subjunctive and imperative 
moods, and hung candles over them. 

Child waited till he had done, and then asked 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


1 1 1 


him if he had got any whisky. He himself had been 
in too much of a hurry to stop for it. 

Fursey nodded towards the hollow old banyan 
trunk in the midst of its daughter columns. Child 
stretched a huge arm, and pulled out a bottle. He 
drank. 

“You know,” he said by and by, “there’s some- 
thing about that Secretary chap — ” 

“I know,” said Fursey, still shuffle-dancing. It 
seemed as if he never could keep quiet. 

“Something,” concluded Child, “that one likes, 
rather.” 

“Sometimes,” said Fursey, dancing in the dust, 
“you talk as if you’d been to Harrow.” 

“So I was, damn me,” answered Child. 

“Oh, you’re damned quite enough,” answered 
Fursey. He never stopped dancing. 

Child looked as if he could have struck him. 

“Don’t,” said Fursey. “The islands will stand 
a good deal, but they wouldn’t stand that if I yapped. 
I would, you know. You’re an dme damnee as we 
used to call it. My dme damnee,*^ he laughed. “As 
long as I know, and no one else does. Ho-o, Child, 
if I yapped?” 

Child looked at him again. You might — if you 
had been thinking of snakes — have thought just then 
how they looked when they waked up from sleep, 
and let a black tongue waver in and out of scaled, 
seeming-close-shut lips. But he said nothing. 

“Well,” said Fursey, suddenly ceasing his shuffle, 
“it’s ‘Home, boys, home, and it’s home we ought 
to be.’ ” He sang the line not unmelodiously. 
“Maraki, you clear out. We’ll wait five minutes 
to let him get well off. He’s too useful to spoil, is 
Maraki.” 


I 12 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“What are you going to do?” asked Child. “You 
know Conn locks up when he goes away.” 

“I’m going,” said Fursey, “to get over the gate 
with a plain common ladder, and then put a small 
tooth-comb through the house. And you and Smith 
and Mac are going to help me.” 

“Do you think you’ll find what it is?” asked Child, 
with somewhat more than the usual flavour of scorn 
in his voice. He always spoke to Fursey scornfully, 
because Fursey, he felt, was an “outsider.” He was 
afraid of him, in spite of the scorn. Fursey usually 
spoke teasingly and sometimes insultingly to Child. 
He liked him, on the whole, and it was nothing at 
all to him that Child did not return the liking. 

“No. I think we’ll find out something that will 
help us to find out what it is.” 

“Now you’re talking.” 

“I generally do,” swelled Fursey. “Come on.” 

Through the banyan forest they had to walk 
duck-file, but once out on the beach roadway Child 
lunged up alongside the tripping Fursey. 

“I heard something else in the town,” he said. 
“You know the girl who came up last week on the 
boat, who’s been staying at the Mission?” 

“Yes,” said Fursey, twirling his absurdly long 
and spiked moustache. “Her name’s Miss Rogers. 
She’s about five feet five, brown hair, lots of it, 
with a shade of red and gold in the sun — I like them 
with that hair — hazel eyes as big as your fist, nice 
little mouth, kissable, quite — good figure, a bit on 
the slim side, large two in shoes, I should say, five 
and three-quarters in gloves. About twenty-six, or 
maybe twenty-seven. Whatever she’s come up for, 
it’s not to be a missionary.” He twirled his mous- 
tache again, and walked more than ever on his toes. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 113 

“Been intending to call at the Mission, and get an- 
other look at her — ” 

“You seem to have made the best of any look 
you’ve had.” 

“Saw her once, for ten seconds, on the steamer, 
night she came in. Well, I haven’t gone to the 
Mission yet, because there’s what you call a coolness 
— on account of those native girls — ” 

“I know.” 

“But if I don’t run across her anywhere else, I 
will, and chance it. ’S not -often one gets a look at 
a decent looking skirt up here.” 

“Well, I can tell you something,” said Child, and 
he related the tale of Deirdre’s mistake; of her fear 
that she had found the pearlers’ island, and her lying 
hidden in Conn’s house, through the dinner and 
through the night that followed. How had the tale 
got out? Conn had not told, neither, assuredly, had 
Deirdre. . . . Maraki, perhaps, with his lurkings 
and watchings, might have been able to say. There 
are few secrets kept in the world of the western 
islands. 

Fursey yelled with laughter; he staggered with 
it; he stopped on the road to lean up against a palm 
trunk, and laugh and laugh. 

“Thought she’d struck Wawaka; oh, my Lord!” 
he crowed. “Why didn’t she? Eh, why didn’t she, 
old son?” 

Suddenly he stopped his laughter; stopped Child, 
too, in some comments that the latter was making, 
expressive of his belief that the tale would bear 
another colour than that put on it. “Let me think,” 
he said. He became grave, chewed the ends of his 
moustache, and walked along with a sober gait. 
They neared the town; the little band of fugitive. 


114 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


lost houses, balancing on the edge of the sea, came 
into sight; the sunset, grave and golden, showed be- 
tween the blackening peaks of Wawa and Wawaka 
islands. Child had not spoken again. It was never 
advisable to interrupt Fursey’s fits of deliberation. 
There had been a man on the pearling island, years 
ago, who had gone all his days to death with a 
blinded eye, because of one such interruption. . . . 

Fursey drew a long breath, let go his moustache, 
and began to talk. 

“The whaleboat’ll be half-way there by dark,” 
he said. “Give them tomorrow and the day after 
to square things up, and the evening to return. That 
gives us all the time we want.” But Child knew, 
somehow, that he was not, for the moment, thinking 
of Conn. 


Up on the top of the Commissioner’s high, windy 
Island, Gatehouse, the Secretary, left alone, wan- 
dered restlessly about. From verandah to verandah 
he went, watching the whaleboat through a field- 
glass till it vanished round a point of rocky land; 
then stared down moodily upon the tossing sea of 
palm-tops spread below the house. Alone, like this, 
he was not the man that Conn had seen; not even 
the man that the Commissioner knew In his daily 
work — quiet, courteous, non-committal, and all the 
time cold, cold. . . . Alone, Gatehouse became 
himself. 

His eyes, veiled no longer, showed the black fire 
that smouldered, daily, unseen. The thin tight lips 
were tight no longer; they opened over pointed teeth, 
and laughed, now and then, at some strange thought 
or fancy that never came to the birth of words. His 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 115 


very limbs seemed to relax; he sprawled when he 
sat down, loafed over the verandah rail when he 
looked out upon the sea. He stretched his arms 
above his head in an abandonment of ease. 

A native, paddling up to the steps of the front 
verandah, shuffled and coughed as natives do, to 
attract his attention. Gatehouse, in an instant be- 
came his daily self again, and moved round to the 
front of the house. It was an island chief who was 
waiting, a big buck of a fellow with the inevitable 
old, yet deadly musket slung over his shoulder, 
trigger on full cock, and muzzle bobbing defiance. 
No one in Meliasi ever understood how it was that 
accidental deaths did not punctuate every hour of 
the day, for all the New Cumberlanders had guns, 
and all carried them over the shoulder, loaded and 
at full cock, all day long, more for fear of each 
other than because of any fear of white people. . . . 
There had been a white-man or two accidentally 
winged; one killed, a year or two ago. Blackbury, 
then, had done his best to prevent the natives from 
carrying guns in the town, but with no law and no 
soldiers or police to back him, he had ignominiously 
failed. 

The chief had some petition to make; some in- 
justice suffered to tell about. He asked for Black- 
bury; was informed that the Commissioner was 
away, and further told that Gatehouse was chief in 
his stead. 

The Secretary, new as he was to the islands, spoke 
the Meliasi tongue with wonderful fluency. He ex- 
plained to the native that he was, as it were, king 
over Meliasi for the present; he would give judg- 
ment, settle disputes. . . . The chief, an islander 
from far out, heard with reverence, and bending 


ii6 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


down, knocked his woolly head upon the steps of the 
verandah before he began his trifling tale. Gate- 
house seemed to swell as he looked at the man. 

If Blackbury, the Commissioner, had been any- 
where within hearing. Instead of half a day away, It 
Is probable that the Secretary would have learned 
what it was to experience an ofiiclal “wigging” of 
the most forcible kind, for Gatehouse, In judging the 
case laid before him by the chief, did everything that 
he did not do when Blackbury was present, every- 
thing, almost, that Blackbury had specially warned 
him not to do. He represented “Beritania” as the 
one and only power in the islands, himself as ex- 
ponent of that power. He promised large, illimita- 
ble things. ... If the people of the hill villages 
had indeed come down and carried away the chief’s 
best, newest wife ; had made her a slave in the yam 
gardens, and refused, with threatenings and scorn, 
even to consider the question of damages as laid 
down by native custom — then. Gatehouse promised, 
compensation should be had, and he would bring it 
himself. But the chief was to be silent about the 
matter. It might be a little while before Beritania’s 
great representative could get free from cares of 
state, and make the expedition required. If anything 
wxre known beforehand. . . . 

The chief quite understood; he bowed his fuzzy 
head on his cocoanut-oiled breast, and humbly of- 
fered, as retaining fee, a thrice curled round white 
boar tusk, of worth untold. Gatehouse, again break- 
ing through all Residency rules, accepted it, care- 
lessly, as one who has no need of further treasure, 
and pointed to the steps, to mark the end of the 
audience. 

But the chief had somewhat more to say. Savage 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 117 

though he might be, he was a judge of character, and 
set down Gatehouse as a person to whom one might 
sell bits of exclusive information. He had picked 
up one, canoeing across from his island that morning. 

“The fat lord has sent the thin one back,” he 
blurted out, in his own tongue, watching Gatehouse’s 
face. It showed him nothing. But the Secretary 
beckoned him farther into the verandah. 

“Where did you see that?” he asked. 

“Close to Koro. I know about the fight, and the 
other fight, the one they will make today. But the 
thin chief is not going. Lord, he never meant to 
go. He meant to go to some other place. And 
when they were far out behind the island, then the 
fat chief let him take the canoe, and he got out of 
the whaleboat and went.” 

Gatehouse kept his self-control, but could not hide 
the sparkle in his eyes. 

“More,” he said brusquely. 

“I am hungry for tobacco,” was the answer. 

The Secretary tossed a handful of dark sticks on 
the floor. Picking them up unconcernedly with his 
toes, the native went on as if he had never stopped. 
“But I do not know where he went, for he turned 
into the great forest, where it is full of devils, and 
no one except the sorcerers dare to go.” 

“What part of the forest?” demanded Gatehouse. 

“By the point next but two to Koro.” 

Gatehouse considered. He was quite as anxious 
as anyone else in the New Cumberlands to unearth 
the secret of Conn’s mysterious riches, but he knew 
that there would be no use — less than no use — in 
attempting to follow him. It was best to store up 
the information, and utilize it later on. 

He dismissed the chief, with a further present of 


ii8 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


tobacco — it came to three-halfpence a stick, but was 
down in the entertainment accounts — and went into 
his own room, where something long and heavy lay 
wrapped up in folds of canvas. Disinterred, it 
proved to be a telescope of high power, with a col- 
lapsing stand. Gatehouse never used it except when 
he was alone; the Commissioner did not even know 
he possessed it. In truth, the Secretary was not 
minded to put it to official uses, and so destroy the 
exclusive prestige he reaped from certain mysterious 
discoveries and private stores of knowledge. 

From his own room, with the telescope trained 
first on one island and then on another, he scoured 
the whole horizon. Distant hills, far-off shores, 
leaped into sudden prominence and nearness as he 
swept the fine instrument over them. No, there was 
nothing to be seen about the Koro neighbourhood; 
it was hopelessly shut off by a projecting mountain. 
Waka, the Mission island, showed up clear and 
daintily bright as a little painted toy. Wawaka, the 
pearlers’ island, was half hidden behind Wawa, 
Conn’s home. He noticed that the pearling boats 
were not out that morning, and wondered why. He 
looked again at Wawa, more carefully this time. 
The house, on the high pointed peak of the island, 
stood half in view, half hidden by flowering trees. 
There was something moving among those trees 
. . . surely. . . . 

Only the great telescope could have done it; 
Blackbury’s binoculars, fine as they were, would not 
have shown more than moving dots. But Gatehouse, 
adjusting the focus with care, saw more. He saw 
the figures of four men in khaki clothes, such as 
Fursey and his crowd were accustomed to wear, ad- 
vancing carefully towards the house under the shade 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 119 

of the trees. No doubt they thought themselves in- 
visible ; and they would have been under ordinary 
circumstances, to anything in the harbour or be- 
yond it. 

Gatehouse raised the telescope, and began sweep- 
ing the waters behind Wawa, without any very 
definite object. It was nothing to him if Conn’s 
place was looted. Less than nothing. He did not 
like the man. He wondered what the girl was like 
— the woman, rather — who had had that odd adven- 
ture. He pondered over the name, biting his sharp 
moustache, and thinking hard. His thinking did not 
seem to come to any definite conclusion; a puzzled 
look came, and remained, until it was chased out 
by the sight of something that crept, slowly, almost 
imperceptibly, across the field of the lens that he was 
still looking through. 

It was a small figure in a canoe; a woman in dark 
clothes. It came from the Mission island, and it 
was — undoubtedly — heading for the landing-place 
at Wawa. 

Gatehouse looked again, to make sure — although 
he was sure enough as it was — and then, carefully, 
but with all possible swiftness, dismantled the tele- 
scope, rolled it up, and dropped it behind a rampart 
of cabin trunks. He took his sun helmet off the 
verandah wall as he went out, and put it on his 
head as he ran down the track that led to the beach. 
The canoe boy heard him calling sharply and was up 
and out of his palm-leaf shelter hy^ the waves, before 
the “white lord” had come into view. . . . 

Gatehouse ran out of the shelter of the wooded 
track, as the boy was dragging down the canoe that 
served for occasional use, in the absence of the official 
boat. He called for the second canoe boy, still 


120 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


dozing over betelnut and lime gourd in the shelter 
of the hut It seemed that there was hard paddling 
to be done. . . . 

There was. The boys were winded before they 
were half-way to the nearest island, but Gatehouse, 
seizing a spare paddle himself, drove it deep in the 
water, and made the foam spurt up about the blade, 
shouting the while to the natives to keep them hard 
at work. 

So, splashing and driving, they went across the 
bay. 


CHAPTER VIII 


T>EFORE Deirdre, as she went, opened out the 
wonderful reaches of Meliasi harbour. She 
watched them, enjoying the insolent splendour of 
the greens and blues, the far-flung defiance of the 
unexplored black hills that lay beyond. She thought, 
as the canoe slipped over, rather than through, those 
warm, light-rippling waters where no cold wind, 
no bitter rains of winter, came from century to cen- 
tury, that it was strange she should have a mind 
enough at ease to enjoy the beauty of the place and 
the day. For things had gone badly with Deirdre. 

The Mission people had received her kindly 
enough; her letters of introduction were satisfactory, 
and her willingness to pay for her board even more 
so. They were not rich, these mission folk of the 
New Cumberlands, and they had been taken in more 
than once by loafers and beach combers, dear to keep 
and hard to get rid of. So that, for the first day 
or two, she was a welcome guest. 

Deirdre herself had stayed so often in Mission 
houses that they were old ground to her. She liked 
them on the whole. She liked the atmosphere of 
quiet and peace, of remoteness from trading or 
political affairs. She liked the neat bright native 
pupils, male and female, who ran about doing ready 
service in the houses, or accompanying visitors on 
their walks. She was simple-minded enough to find 
pleasure in the religious services, of any and every 
121 


122 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


kind, and to enjoy the inspection of native schools, 
the going over of copybooks and looking at prize 
exercises, that were an inevitable part of each visit. 
Always, she had been liked at Mission houses, had 
been pressed to come again, to stay as long as she 
chose. . . . 

Whereas, the missionaries of Meliasi had all but 
turned her out. 

It had been well with her, till the news of her 
mistake in landing on Wawa instead of Waka Island 
had crept across from Meliasi town. Then, the wife 
of the chief missionary, a Lady Paramount in the 
little community of Waka, had come to her with cold 
eyes and stiff manner, and asked if indeed it were 
true that she had gone to Mr. Conn’s place, on ar- 
rival, and had stayed there, unchaperoned, till next 
day. Deirdre replied promptly that it was true, 
and had explained the circumstances, expecting to 
see a light of comprehension dawn over the face of 
Mrs. Saul, and to be told that it was all quite right. 
In fact, she thought the reverend lady (it was im- 
possible to think of Mrs. Saul without that adjective) 
would make her something like an apology. 

But her tale was received in silence — dead silence 
— silence that grew more dead with every moment 
it lasted. Mrs. Saul looked at her, and if ever a 
look directed by one woman at another said, ‘‘I do 
not believe you,” Mrs. Saul’s look said that and 
nothing else. 

The truth was that Mrs. Saul had not much ap- 
proved of Deirdre from the first. She was too 
pretty, for one thing. Mrs. Saul considered pretti- 
ness that passed a certain point to verge on the in- 
delicate; and she felt that the point was passed, and 
overpassed, by Deirdre. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


123 


Then Mrs. Saul had heard Deirdre’s songs, and 
thought them — especially “Your Shadow On My 
Heart” — “not altogether nice.” Mrs. Saul belonged 
to the second of the two classes into which mis- 
sionary wives may be grouped — the first being 
the pretty girl whom the missionary has picked up 
on furlough, and the second the virgin of medium 
attractions, whom he has wedded “on the. field.” 
She believed in what she called “sensible” love. The 
sort of thing described in Deirdre’s songs was not 
sensible. She would not have liked to say what it 
was. But a girl who could write songs like that was 
not the sort of girl to whom one could readily par- 
don any escapades in bachelors’ houses. One could 
not, of course, in a place like Meliasi, turn the girl 
out. But one could walk away without answering 
what one felt to be a lying tale, and one could later 
on in the day, mention, pointedly, the date of the 
next steamer. That would surely be comprehensible. 

It was. Deirdre comprehended very clearly in- 
deed. And, while the unpleasant and choking meal 
that followed was in progress, she had time to re- 
member that the Mission canoe was on the beach, 
and that any one of the merry black boys and girls 
would be only too glad to take her on a surreptitious 
voyage of discovery. They were not allowed to 
leave the island, but Deirdre did not feel like con- 
sidering that overmuch. Nor did she feel like giving 
in to the prejudices of the reverend lady, with regard 
to bachelors and their establishments. In calmer 
moments, she was all for Mrs. Grundy herself, but 
it is women like the Reverend Mrs. Saul who tear 
Mrs. Grundy’s sceptre from her hand, when all is 
said and done, far more than those who label them- 
selves “unconventional.” 


124 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

At this moment, It seemed to Deirdre that all 
proper people — especially all very proper people — 
were In the last degree abominable. She was In the 
mood, as she put It to herself, to “give them some- 
thing to cry for.” And towards this end, she kid- 
napped a very willing native lad, also the canoe, and 
set forth to Wawa Island. She would go up there 
and make a morning call on Mr. Conn, and hang 
Mrs. Grundy! There was no Mrs. Grundy in the 
New Cumberlands anyhow, outside of Waka. She 
would get him to find out for her where she could 
go, in Meliasi town — ^there was sure to be some 
place or other — and she would take her goods away 
from Waka, and get to the mainland township, that 
very night. 

The sense of freedom and escape upheld her, as 
she went across the bay. She had been somewhat 
stifled In the Mission after all — she, Deirdre, the 
wanderer, with the never resting foot, and the heart 
that drove her always on and on. Through her 
mind, while the paddle dipped and dripped, ran the 
lines from “Ulysses” that every wanderer knows — 

^‘Much have I seen 

Of cities, councils, climates. Governments. . • . 

I am become a name 

For ever roaming with a hungry heart.*’ 

A schooner, near Meliasi wharf, had finished un- 
loading, and was spreading her tall, triangular sails 
to the beckoning trade-wind. Deirdre, in the stern 
of the canoe, murmured to herself, half singing — 
one could so easily set It to a song — 

‘‘There lies the port, the vessel puffs her sail. 

There gloom the dark broad seas, my mariners !” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


125 


One of the spells that held her heart in fee was 
that last line. She never murmured it to herself 
without feeling a shudder of strange delight creep 
down her spine and crisp her skin, as if cool water 
had suddenly flowed on her. She supposed that no 
one else in the world felt as she felt, about these 
scraps, half lines, these single words that could lift 
one to such a curious state of ecstasy. Yet she won- 
dered if it were possible that anyone else shared 
her folly. 

“Adrian thought it silly,” she remembered. “I 
wonder — there might be — somewhere or other — 
some man who wouldn’t. These things are -bigger 
than they seem. If one knew someone who would 
explain them. . . . But if one did, one might like 
him too well.” 

And the sum of her thought, as she sprang out 
of the canoe on the white beach of Wawa, was “God 
keep me from knowing such a man.” 

In which she was not more illogical — if you come 
to think of it — ^than you, or than I. 

It was a short journey up to the top of the island 
today. She could not help laughing at the thought 
of the evening — so recent, yet so far past — when 
she had taken this place for Waka. Waka! with 
the riot of luxury, the delight in beautiful things 
that cried out at every step of the road! No — ^the 
Reverend Mrs. Saul not to speak of that worthy and 
pious man, her husband, could never have had a hand 
in the making of Wawa. That there was something 
in it all akin to her own nature, Dcirdre felt today, 
more clearly than she had felt it on her first visit 
to the island. Wawa and its hanging terraces of 
flowers, its winding steps that gave you glimpses of 
magical blue lakes of sea, its drinking fountain that 


126 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


chattered, solitary, to the wheeling sun, was after 
her very heart. 

She topped the rise, light-footed, and saw the 
white concrete house upon its plateau. The grille 
was shut. A pang of disappointment shot through 
her. Why had she not considered that Conn might 
be away? 

Then she noticed something further — a step-lad- 
der, set astride the spiked iron railing that sur- 
mounted the height of the gate. 

It puzzled her at first, without alarming her. She 
supposed that some one of the native servants must 
have adopted this means of getting into the house, 
in his master’s absence. Deirdre, as an experienced 
island traveller, knew well the thieving habits of 
dark-skinned house and cook boys. 

All the housewife in her awoke. 

“They’ll take his tea and sugar and meat,” she 
said to herself. “They’ll have a couple of tins of 
kerosene away into the villages before he comes 
back. What a shame !” 

She stood and looked at the ladder. It was a 
double step-ladder; nothing could be easier than to 
mount it, cross the locked gate, and find the thieves 
at work. Yet somehow, she hesitated. . . . 

... A long way off, near the point of land that 
ran into the sea beside Koro, Conn was just getting 
over the gunwale of the Commissioner’s big whale- 
boat Into a tiny canoe. He seemed to act with 
somewhat less than his usual crisp decision of man- 
ner. Sitting on the gunwale, with the “dug-out” 
swaying beneath his feet, he half hung back. 

“I don’t know that I oughtn’t to go on with you, 
sir,” he was saying. 

“What’s the use?” answered Blackbury. “Of 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 127: 

course I may as well visit Koro now I’m here, but 
the whole thing has petered out since we heard the 
fellow’s alive after all. I might have burned a vil- 
lage or two for killing a white man, but there’s no 
sense in doing* it because somebody gave a clip 
on the head — likely he deserved it — that laid him out 
for a day. If I had a proper code of laws, and 
proper powers of administration — but there, it’s no 
use talking about that. Anyhow, if you want to 
look up the villages, there’s nothing on earth to pre- 
vent you doing it.” 

“I know,” said Conn, still hesitating, “but I shan’t 
get home quickly. If I kept with you. I’d be back 
tonight.” 

“Any reason for wanting to be back?” 

Conn hesitated. “I suppose there’s none,” he 
said. He did not like to mention the curious fear 
that had taken hold of him, of things being just now 
wrong, very wrong, at home. How could they be 
wrong? Even if something had happened to his 
house, he knew what he knew; he wished any 
meddlers joy of what they’d get. No, nothing could 
be wrong. It must be a touch of fever — or of sun. 

“No reason,” he produced at last. “I’ll go on.” 

Long after he was ashore, tramping through the 
dusk of the great forest on an errand known only 
to himself, the uneasiness followed bim. Conn was 
a Celt; clairvoyance and second-sight were more 
than mere words to him. He could not go back; 
the nature of his errand forbade it. But he resolved 
to spend no more than the one necessary night away. 
With dawn, he would be on the road back to Wawa, 
as quick as boats, canoes, and his own quick feet 
could carry him. 


128 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


Deirdre, standing alone In the sun and the warm 
wind, on the peak of Wawa Island, felt curiously 
lonely. The big white house, deserted and locked, 
rose up before her like a visible reminder of her dis- 
appointment. She knew now that she was disap- 
pointed — amazingly so — at not finding Conn in his 
home. What was she going to do ? 

Well, one thing she certainly would do, before she 
went over to the town or back to the Mission. She 
would get over the wall and catch those thieves at 
their work. The solidarity of race, felt by all 
Europeans who live among dark people, forbade 
her to go away and leave the natives destroying a 
white man’s property. 

It was easy to get over the wall. She was 
up and down, and safely landed on the paving 
inside In a few seconds. There was nobody In 
the courtyard; nobody on the shaded pillared 
verandahs, where bougainvillaea, bishop-purple, hung 
out gorgeous tapestries to the ruffling of the wind. 
Deirdre was wearing the rubber-soled shoes that 
are commonly used in the islands; her feet made no 
noise as she passed from room to room. At first 
she heard nothing. The house seemed as quiet and 
deserted as on the evening when she had come up 
from the steamer, and made herself a prisoner in 
the box. . . . 

What was that? People talking? She thought 
so. But it was low, murmured speech ; one could not 
catch any words. Were the tones native? Hard to 
be sure. She almost thought they were not — but 
that was Impossible. . . . She followed the sound, 
stepping noiselessly in her rubber-soled shoes, strain- 
ing forward to hear. 

A door was open — a door that had been shut when 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


129 


she was there before. In the lock — she could see, 
craning round the corner of the verandah — hung a 
bunch of odd-looking spikey keys. From the room 
inside came the voices she had heard. And now she 
was sure they were not native. For she could hear 
the words — a confused babbling of low-toned talk, 
two or three people together. 

. . can fix it up as if it had never been opened; 
what do you take me for? Only a common sort of 
safe at . . . marks on the goods show he’s found 
a market of his own; who ever heard of tommy’awks 
at such a price, and they’re steel, too, not cast . . . 
to hell with those beads, the safe is littered up with 
them — chuck them — the nuggets tell the tale; I 
always said it was gold.” 

Completely, in an instant, she understood. Some- 
body had broken into the house in Conn’s absence, 
and was looting his goods. 

She had felt equal to confronting any number of 
native thieves, but this was another matter. Conn 
must protect himself against whites ; she was almost 
certain it was the inhabitants of Wawaka who were 
at work in there, and she had no desire at all to 
make their acquaintance after such a fashion; or in- 
deed after any fashion at all. The thing was to 
get away, to do it as quickly as possible, and to do 
it' without being heard. 

Soundlessly, tiptoeing over the paved verandah 
floor, she crept out towards the gate. She had her 
foot on the ladder; another minute and she would 
have been safe over the gate. But in that minute 
she had been perceived by Conn’s great white 
cockatoo, that lived partly on his roof and partly 
in the surrounding bush. It had been already much 
perturbed by the invasion of strange people. One 


130 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


more stranger was the last straw. The cockatoo 
flopped down from its perch on the fountain basin, 
where it had been dancing uneasily for some time; 
half ran, half flew across the patio, and launched 
itself, with crest erect and flapping wings, straight 
at Deirdre. And it screamed, meanwhile, as only 
a cockatoo, alarmed, can scream. 

Deirdre had no desire to receive the assault of 
the furious bird. She parried it as well as she could 
with her sunshade, backing away as she did so. In 
the hurry of the moment, she did not note where 
she was going; and so it happened that she backed 
right on to a table set in a recess of the verandah, 
and laid with cups and saucers, ready for Conn’s 
return. It went over with a crash, scattering the 
china all over the paved floor. The cockatoo, 
alarmed at the disaster, which it instantly credited 
to itself, fled back to the fountain, pathetically cry- 
ing, “Mother, mother, mother!” 

Deirdre stood dumbfounded for a moment. Then 
things began to happen. Out of the room with the 
dangling bunch of keys bolted four men. One was 
very tall, one short and chunky, two undistinguished. 
They seemed in a tremendous hurry, but when they 
saw her, they all stopped short, and for a moment, 
the whole party fell into something resembling the 
stillness-in-action of one of the stereograph pictures 
that had delighted Deirdre’s youth. Long after, it 
remained stamped upon her mind — the white pave- 
ment of the verandah, the tapestried bougainvillaea 
throwing purple shadows, the tall man with the dead, 
queer face looking at her as if she were a spectre, 
and as if he didn’t mind a bit; the short chunky man, 
who struck her as being appallingly vulgar — she did 
not know why — holding his hat in one hand, and 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 13 1 

striking an attitude of gallant admiration strangely 
mingled with the air of a child who has been caught 
at a jam-pot. What she could not see was herself, 
a slim, bright-haired figure in vaporous black, set, 
with amazingly brilliant effect, in the westering sun 
and the sunlit, puce-purple flowers. 

The picture broke. The chunky man came for- 
ward, and with a smile that was mild, obliging, even 
innocent, introduced himself and his friends. 

“Miss Rogers, I presume,” he said. “Allow me 
to make you acquainted with Mr. Child, Mr. Smith, 
and Mr. Mac. It isn’t any*of their names, but per- 
haps Miss Rogers isn’t yours either.” 

Deirdre flushed almost as red as the bougain- 
villaeas. How had this little scoundrel — for she 
guessed without difliculty that the name of the man 
himself was Fursey — managed to hit the mark with 
his random arrow so easily? 

There was nothing mysterious about it, if she had 
known. Fursey, a consummate judge of all that 
was bad or doubtful in human nature, had set her 
down at once as too good looking to have reached 
the latter twenties unsweethearted; as too young to 
be roaming the world alone and unprotected, unless 
she had forfeited, in some manner or other, the 
countenance of her friends. He saw the shot go 
home, and giggled, under his preposterous red mous- 
tache. When Fursey giggled, his intimates were apt 
to take in sail; squalls, gales and water spouts had 
been known to follow such bursts of untimely sun. 

Deirdre did not know this, but she did not like 
the giggle. It suddenly occurred to her that the 
top of Wawa Island, in the wild New Cumberlands, 
was a long, a very long way from safety and 
civilization. 


132 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

Beginning to be frightened, she still kept her head, 
outwardly, and decided that It was best to speak as 
if the encounter were quite an ordinary one. She 
was not bound to know what the men had ‘been up 
to. The less they thought she knew, the better, no 
doubt, it would be for her. 

“Perhaps,” she said, with a white little smile, 
“Pm better known as Deirdre; I write songs, you 
know.” 

Over the face of the chunky man came an expres- 
sion of interest. 

“Do you?” he said, and swore an oath that made 
Deirdre wonder whether she had dreamt it — it 
seemed impossible that anyone out of a nightmare 
should say such things, and say them, moreover, 
with a smiling, almost a gratified face. “Do you, 

then , , . You shall sing them to 

me, you shall, my pretty little lady.” And he sealed 
the pronouncement with another of those ‘rattling 
blasts. 

“I am in hell,” said Deirdre’s mind to her. 
“People could not say such things out of hell.” She 
kept tight hold of the handle of her parasol. It 
seemed that if she did not keep hold of something, 
she would faint. 

“Well,” said Fursey, twisting his moustache in 
a way that made her think of a cat washing its face, 
“there’s a good sort of a piano in there. I’m fond 
of music. If I ain’t — ” He said what might happen 
to him if he was not. 

All this time, the dead-alive looking man whom 
Fursey had called Child stood looking at them, and 
not seeing them. But for some unknown reason, he 
suddenly bestirred himself now. Mac and Smith, 
two unshaven, weak-chinned fellows in dirty white 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 133 

clothes, leaned up against the wall and watched. 
Child took a step forwards. 

“Let her alone,” he said. 

“Who are you ?” asked Fursey, beginning to giggle 
again. 

Deirdre saw the two men in the background sud- 
denly straighten up, and begin to watch, with a vivid 
interest, that she did not, somehow like. 

“Let her alone.” 

“Who are you?” asked Fursey for the second 
time, and he was not giggling now. “What are 
you?” 

It was a simple question, but it might have been 
a bullying address ten minutes long, for the effect 
that it had on Child. He crumpled up, almost 
physically. One hand, that he had raised and 
clenched, sank to his side. His eyes lost the half 
light that had crept into them. He was once more 
a corpse. 

The other men relaxed their attention. It seemed 
to Deirdre that they were mysteriously disappointed. 

“Here,” said Fursey, the unmistakable note of 
authority in his voice. “Take this key; it’ll open 
Conn’s cellar room. Go and make your damned 
selves happy.” 

“What about the safe?” asked the man called 
Smith, nervously. 

“We’ve been had there. Had — H-A-D. Wher- 
ever it is, it isn’t there. And that’s something to 
know. So go and make beasts of yourselves. As 
for me, the lady and I are going to be refined and 
sit in the drawing room, and have a little music.” 
He laid a hand on Deirdre’s shoulder. Light as the 
touch was, it propelled like a touch from the buffer 
of a railway engine. With whirling mind, the girl 


134 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


felt herself swept along the verandah, and in at the 
drawing-room door, hardly knowing how the thing 
had come about. Fursey had not been violent; he 
had scarcely touched her. But there she was, and 
there was he, spread out in the biggest of the arm- 
chairs, a cigar in one hand and a match in the other. 

“Go to the piano — please be so kind as to go 
to the piano,” he said, with the giggle beginning to 
work again. “Play me and sing me your songs. 
I’d like to know if you’ve been lying. I don’t think 
any the less of a little lady for lying, mind you; 
they all do it — ^but it amuses me to know. Did you 
ever read of Scheherazade?” 

“Yes,” answered Deirdre, still wondering if the 
whole mad scene were not a dream, and at the same 
time, wishing madly that Conn would but come 
back. “Come back, come back!” she called him, 
wordlessly. 

And at that moment. Conn, with his leg over the 
gunwale of the whaleboat, ready to disembark, drew 
back and hesitated . . . and went on. 

“Well,” said Fursey, lighting his cigar, “you re- 
member that she had to keep the king amused as 
long as he chose, and when she stopped, he cut off 
her head. Or meant to. It’s all the same. Go on, 
little lady, let’s hear you. I am a musician, I am. 
I’m an artist — a man of feeling. If I’m not — ” 
and then came the string of blasphemy again. “So 
long as you keep me amused, you can keep your 
little head on your shoulders. Off with you.” 

To the end of her life, Deirdre never forget that 
scene. 

Fursey had drunk as much as was good for him, 
before starting out from his island, and it had 
scarcely had time to wear off. A tantalus and syphon 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 135 

of Conn’s, standing on a side table, supplied him 
with the means of keeping himself — what he would 
have called — up to the mark. There were more 
marks than one, in the little scoundrel’s method of 
intoxication. The first kept him normal, free from 
the “blues” and ill tempers that are the lot of the 
drinking man deprived of drink. The second made 
him cheerful, the next freakish and inclined to 
tyrannize. He did not become quarrelsome till the 
fourth stage, or murderous till the fifth. Deirdre 
could not guess all this, but some instinct told her 
to keep him interested and amused. The better he 
was pleased, the fewer glasses of whisky would 
go down that wolf’s throat of his, under the grinning 
red moustache. The fewer glasses passed that way, 
the more chance she had of tiding things over till 
Conn came back. He would come back that night — 
that afternoon. He must! 

In the years that intervened between Teneriffe, 
Adrian Shaw, and Tahiti, Deirdre’s talent had had 
full scope. She had written song after song, some 
famous, sung to death, like “Gypsy Lover,” and “My 
Love Has Wedded the Sea-Wind,” others cared for 
chiefly by musicians, like “Your Shadow On My 
Heart,” and “Home, Home to You.” There were 
yet more, dainty, pretty little songs that had some- 
how failed to catch the public as a whole, and that 
sold only by twoes and threes. Some of the best 
music was included among these ; she knew them all 
by heart, and liked them, perhaps, better than the 
rest. The whole tale ran to dozens, and every one 
of them, from first to last, Fursey made her sing. 

Hour by hour, as the sun climbed down the maple- 
wood panelling of the drawing room, lit green and 
violet fires in the crystal of the chandelier, crept 


136 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

lower to lay long stitching and darning of gold in 
the sombre, handsome covers of sofas and chairs, 
touched the floor at last, and split the parquetting 
with a burst of light, as if strange fires were break- 
ing up from underneath — did Deirdre play, and sing, 
and sing. Her voice was a natural one, trained by 
teachers who knew their work, and had not spoilt 
its light facility of production — otherwise she had 
broken down early in the trial. She was proof 
against any common strain, as an opera singer ac- 
customed to long nights of vocal exercise might have 
been proof. But this was more than a common 
strain. Not even in opera does a singer go on with- 
out break, without rest, thousands and thousands of 
notes following one another. There are pauses, in- 
tervals; other singers hold the stage; the curtain 
goes down for the next act. No curtain dropped for 
Deirdre ; the little scoundrel in the satin chair lolled, 
put up his boots on the table at his side, smoked and 
smoked, and drank steadily down the tantalus bottle ; 
and all the time he kept her hard at work. 

She sang “Your Shadow On My Heart.” She j 
sang “Gypsy Lover.” She sang “Home, Home to 
You.” She sang them again and a third time, and i 
a fourth. She sang other songs, and repeated them j 
when told. As Fursey grew more drunk, he ceased i 
to demand repetitions, he wanted new songs all the 
time. And she sang them. Her fingers seemed al- 
most paralyzed at times, the notes died away in her 
throat, and only came back when she forced them. 
The pedals, under her feet, grew stiff; the music 
stool tortured her unsupported back. She sang on. 
The only thing in the world she feared was stopping. 

Fursey knew she was tired; it amused him exceed- 
ingly, He was in the mood that the American cow- 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


137 


boy of long ago used to be in, when he made 
inoffensive strangers dance to the shots of his pistol, 
directed at their feet. Fursey would not shoot at 
a woman; he would not — usually — strike one. But 
it delighted him to keep Deirdre on the music stool, 
singing. If she had fallen off in a dead faint, he 
would have laughed himself sick. 

Besides — of such strange elements are we com- 
pounded — he really liked the music very much, and 
wanted it to go on. If he had had a phonograph — 
but this was before the day of the universal talking 
machine — he would have done as many men in the 
islands do to-day; kept it going all day and half the 
night. This was a human phonograph. He kept it 
at work; sucked Conn’s cigars, drank his whisky, 
and enjoyed himself. 

The sun was getting low. Deirdre, swallowing 
in a throat as dry as the sands of Meliasi beach, 
wondered how much longer she could go on; how 
many more minutes, hours, years, this horrible dream 
would last. She could scarcely conceive it anything 
but a dream. She did not dare to look at Fursey and 
the whisky bottle, though she was almost cer- 
tain he had finished it, and started on the second. 
His voice was changing, had changed; it was no 
longer the affectedly soft and civil tone he had 
chosen to use at first, but a rough-edged snarl, that 
cut her quivering nerves every time she heard it. 
And she was beginning to hear it often. “More new 
ones,” he yelled at her, swinging his glass so that 
it spouted whisky over Conn’s fine Manahiki mats. 
“Find one I haven’t heard before, you blessed Sherry 
— Sherryzaza — or I’ll have your blessed head.’* He 
banged with his glass on the table, and swore again, 
that rattling blast of oaths, more terrifying than 


138 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


any crash of heaven’s thunder. “You’re singing 
lazy,” he yelled. “Sing up, curse you.” 

Suddenly, as she sang, with her tired voice, the 
last song that she could remember — a boat song that 
had in its swinging cadences the magic of lagoons 
swept by flying paddle blades, of stars awash among 
the foam — there came to the girl one of those in- 
spirations that come, flash quick, to creatures driven 
hard. Her many ancestresses and their million ex- 
periences, adventures, disasters, whispered as one 
woman in her ear — “Now is the moment; now, while 
he is unsteady and before he drinks himself mad. 
You are between him and the door. Bolt. There 
may be a chance.” 

Without waiting to finish the song, without an 
instant’s hesitation, she snatched her hands from the 
keys, and leaped through the doorway. Fursey, be- 
mused with drink, did not, for a moment, realize 
what had happened, and in that moment, she had 
gained start enough to put the verandah and the 
courtyard between them. She was half-way up the 
ladder when she heard him stamping after her, in a 
deadly silence more alarming than any of the furious 
noises she had expected to hear. It seemed he was 
not too drunk to run, nor yet to climb, for his feet 
shook the step-ladder on the inner side just as she 
was flinging herself down the outer run of steps. 
She pitched almost on her face as she landed, re- 
covered, and ran straight into the arms of a man 
who was coming up from the beach stairway. It 
seemed that the concussion hurt him, for he instantly 
put out a handkerchief, and put it to his face, speak- 
ing to her indistinctly through the folds. 

“Go down the steps,” he said, “I’ll tackle him.” 
She did not pause to see how the tackling was done. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


139 


Nor did she go all the way down the concrete flight 
that led to the sea. With the cunning of the weak, 
hunted animal, she turned aside half-way down, and 
crept into a clump of scarlet flowering hibiscus trees. 
They had been pruned; they stood dense and low, 
and made a perfect hiding place. On her knees, she 
shook and panted, growing gradually quieter, and 
looking all the time through the chinks among the 
leaves to see what was going to happen. She won- 
dered who the man with the handkerchief might be. 

“Some one of the planters, coming up to see him,” 
she thought, and did not know how much that bare, 
lone pronoun told. . . . 

Whatever she had expected to happen, it was not 
what did happen — a long, droning call from one 
of the shell trumpets common in the islands, repeated 
once and twice, three times in all — then a series of 
short, sharp blasts; seven of them. And then, so 
quickly that she scarce had time to draw back, came 
down the beach stairway Fursey and the man called 
Child, and the two indeterminate, dirty men, and, 
some way in their rear, the man with the handker- 
chief. It was not held to his face now; he had it in 
his hand; but he was looking sidewise as he came 
out over the harbour, where a whaleboat, manned 
by twelve natives, was creeping like a many-legged 
water-beetle over the sunset-gilded sea to Meliasi; 
so Deirdre, crouching among the hibiscus stems, 
could not see his face. Before* she could decide what 
to do, he had gone on down the staircase, and the 
place had become utterly, strangely silent. One 
could hear the locusts clicketing in the grass; huge, 
emerald-armored beetles droning, a faint, far breath 
from spent waves falling on the beach. No more. 

When she decided to creep forth from her hiding 


140 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

place, and go down the stairway — cautiously watch- 
ing the pathway and the sea as she went — she found 
— the island desolate. The whaleboat she had 
noticed while she knelt among the trees had crept 
its way to Meliasi, and was turning round the corner 
of the Residency island. There was a sloop, one 
of the pearling boats, just swinging up into the wind, 
leaning lightly, with the incomparable grace of those 
small island crafts, from the lessened urge of the 
south-easter that was dying now with the fading 
of the day. Deirdre had sharp eyes ; she could see 
that the sloop held four white men. It was running, 
as hard as the lightness of the wind allowed, upon 
the course just traversed by the whaleboat. 

She had recovered her nerve, almost, by now. 
She drank at the little spring, dipped her handker- 
chief in the stone basin, and put a cold compress 
round her throat. “Perhaps I shall have a quinsy 
or something,” she thought. “It’s not the fault of 
that brute, brute, brute, if I don’t. Why didn’t he 
come home? They call him the Hundred Fighter. 
He would have killed that jumpy little fiend. Thank 
God I got away.” She sat down on the edge 
of the fountain, and comforted herself with a few 
tears. 

Oddly, she gave very little^ thought to the man 
who had come up the stairway just in time. She only 
wondered what he had done to set the whole crowd 
running as he did. The motive must have been a 
powerful one indeed, that snatched Fursey from his 
pursuit of herself, and the other men from their 
onslaught upon Conn’s cellar. She remembered now 
— though she had not been conscious of it at the 
time — that all the men came down the staircase with 
wet heads and faces. They must have been sobering 


I CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 141 

themselves by throwing water on one another. She 
had seen it done in Tahiti. 

“When the Commissioner gets to hear of it, he’ll 
arrest — ” she thought, and then broke off. “Why, 
he can’t,” she said wonderingly. “There’s no law 
in the New Cumberlands.” It came upon her with 
curious force, that absence of law. She had not fully 
realized it at first. Tahiti was spoken of as a “law- 
less” place. So was Colon. But they had police; 
they had gaols, the machinery might be rusty, but 
it was^ there, and could be used. Here, about 
Meliasi, one man could loot another’s house, could 
behave to her as those men had behaved today — 
could, indeed, do infinitely worse — and there was 
I nothing whatever that might be done to them, unless 
^ the always hoped-for, never-arriving man-of-war 
I came along, and simply deported them by force of 
I arms. 

“Well,” argued the gypsy in Deirdre’s wandering 
soul, “it’s something to have seen a place like 
that.” 

The Mission lad was lounging on the beach when 
she got down. He spoke amazingly good English; 
he was ready with his comments, at once, on so much 
of the recent affray as he understood. 

“I hope, miss,” he said, scratching his woolly 
, scalp, “that those rough men have not annoyed you. 
j I not know they on the island. They are bad men 
without the truth of the Gospel in them. You have 
stick of tobacco for me, miss?” 

Deirdre had; she carried a bag of that island 
small coin wherever she went. She tipped the boy, 
and asked him whether he could paddle her across 
to the mainland. She had heard that there was a 
decent married trader living opposite Meliasi, on 


142 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


the great island that gave the town its name. She 
would try and get taken in over there. It was said 
that the mainland was not so safe as the various 
islands about the harbour, where most of the white 
people made their homes, but Deirdre was in no 
mood to appreciate the safety of the harbour islands 
that day, nor the advantage of having white neigh- 
bours. She asked the boy a question or two about 
the trader. 

“I think, miss,” he said, “maybe it better you go 
and stay with Misser Blackbird.” 

“Fm going to the trader’s, so you had better take 
me, if you want tobacco,” she answered. 

“Yes, miss, I want tobacco,” he cried. “The Mis- 
sion say it filthy weed, but my stomach all the time 
loves him. You will give me plenty?” 

“Ten sticks.” 

The boy’s eyes glistened. 

“The Lord will reward you, miss, and I will take 
you wherever you like,” he answered piously. Then, 
helping her into the canoe, “miss, I have seen the 
ungodly men going away very quick. I have hear 
the trumpet shell, three time, seven time !” 

“What about? My good boy. I’ll ask you to 
hurry up a bit; it will be dark in half an hour.” 

“I get you there quick, miss, I am very good 
paddler. Miss, you know that when they blow like 
that, it is some one of the natives have seen Misser 
Conn he go after his gold?” 

“No! How? Tell me about that.” 

“Miss,” went on the boy, paddling hard, and evi- 
dently pleased by the interest he had excited, “all 
the native, the pearling men give him tobacco, if 
he blow the trump when he sees Misser Conn going 
away into the bush. Some native been blowing the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 143 

trump on the mainlan’, another hear him on Wawa 
Island, he blow too. Both them, they get tobacco.” 

“And all the pearling men went off to chase?” 

“Yes, miss, they have gone very quick, because 
they wish to catch Misser Conn.” 

“Mr. Conn is over on the mainland, then?” 

“Yes, miss, he went over to the mainlan’ with 
Misser Blackbird this morning, miss, and Misser 
Blackbird he has come back, but not Misser Conn.” 

The canoe slipped on across the strait. Deirdre 
wondered if she were going to live in canoes for 
the future. It seemed that all events and errands 
in the New Cumberlands were inextricably en- 
tangled with canoes. She wondered, too, if one 
might chance to see — but that was impossible. If 
Conn had indeed gone over to see about his mys- 
terious treasure, he would not be found walking 
anywhere in public. 

The boy landed her, received his reward of to- 
bacco, and paddled hurriedly away. It was sunset 
now, as on the evening, not very long ago, when 
she had landed upon Wawa Island, and seen the 
mainland lying opposite. Dark woods, long shore 
growing ivory-grey in twilight, sea turning citron- 
green as the light went down; the wind getting up, 
and blowing cocoanut husk, palm fronds, small 
tinkling twigs of coral along the empty sands — all 
was the same. Yet not the same; the spirit of the 
Western Islands, distantly hovering then, was now 
as near at hand as a vulture planing over its prey. 
The forest impended, cruel, grim, saying almost 
aloud the untellable things that are hinted at in night- 
mares — ^the loneliness of the beach, unlike any lone- 
liness she had ever heard or dreamed of, seared her 
mind as the touch of frozen steel sears the flesh. 


144 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


She had to walk along the full length of the beach 
before finding the road that led to the trader’s. She 
wondered a little why she was not more frightened. 
The New Cumberlands were not the safest place 
in the world, in broad daylight, with an armed escort. 
And here she was, an unarmed girl, wandering alone 
upon a nightmare sort of a beach, with wild can- 
nibals about in the bush, and not even the certainty 
of a roof for her head that night. And she had just 
escaped being captured by Fursey and his crew. She 
ought, she reflected, to have been lying on her bed 
in a darkened room, staving off an attack of nervous 
breakdown. Whereas, she felt only a little tired 
and a little hungry. 

“I suppose,” she mused, “it’s because I have no 
house and no bed to go to. When you mustn’t break 
down, you don’t. I suppose I am horribly frightened, 
inside, if I let myself believe it. Those devil-bird 
things are enough to scare one by themselves. But 
I can’t afford to let them.” 

Out of the black forest, as she toiled along the 
strand, had come, at sunsetting, numberless dark, 
winged, silent things that dipped and fluttered hor- 
ribly close round her head. She struck at them with 
a leaf of palm, but they came, more and more, 
circling, skimming, almost brushing her with their 
soundless wings, as they took bearings for a flight 
away to sea. She knew they were only bats, but 
never, in any of the Eastern Pacific groups, had she 
seen such monsters, or known the brutes so fearless. 
Their green eyes showed like little flames about her, 
their teeth glinted white in the last of the mirrored 
afterglow. Their wings stretched wide as those of 
the albatrosses that had followed Deirdre’s ship, 
far south in New Zealand seas. There was some- 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


145 


thing intimate, hateful, knowing, about them In their 
duskiness and silence, that made them like a daring 
sin. 

Deirdre did not like them; she began to run 
presently, and broke, scarce seeing where she went, 
into the open sandy road at the end of the beach. 
The lagoon threw up enough reflected light for her 
to see where she was. She ran, and beat about her 
with her hands. Suddenly the black wings disap- 
peared; the fluttering ceased. They were gone. She 
stopped at once, out of breath, and panting vaguely 
to herself, “Thank Heaven the brutes are — ” 

Her sentence ended in a cry. 

“Oh! they aren’t!” 

She had come, somehow or other — she did not 
know how — into an open alley with a pale light upon 
it from the rising moon. Along the sides of the 
alley stood dark structures, evenly spaced apart, and 
resembling very tall, very narrow sentry-boxes. On 
the top of each black sentry-box sat, with immense 
brooding wings outspread, one of the giant bats. 
So much she could see, in the dim but growing light. 
She could not tell why the creatures sat so still, nor 
why there was one on the top of every box, nor 
what the boxes might be. 

“This Is certainly a dream,” she thought. “I 
wonder have I been dreaming all along? Things 
in these islands don’t seem very real. What if I 
woke up in Tahiti, or Santa Cruz, after one of those 
hot nights, when there’s a trumpet-flower outside 
your window, and the scent is far too strong, and 
you are restless, and the moon shines In and you 
dream, oh, but dream! Perhaps if I gave a big 
jump I should fall right out of bed.” ^ 

But she did not jump. It seemed impossible to 


146 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


move, in this mysterious dim alley with the strange 
shapes standing on either side, until the moon came 
up. She knew it was coming; the moonrise wind 
was stealing through the trees. 

In a little while, she, watching, saw the wall of 
low forest slowly spangle itself with silver; saw 
silver rays grow up, like magic leaves, among the 
roots of the trees, silver water come streaming 
through their branches. Then, swiftly, as if some 
hidden company of arches had drawn bow, a flight 
of silver arrows fell upon the rank of dark figures 
that faced eastward, and instantly they were photo- 
graphed, black and white, upon the night. And 
Deirdre saw that the bats were not bats, or living 
things of any kind. They were carved images of 
huge dark birds, brooding with wings outspread 
and heads bent down, each above a shrine. And 
inside the shrines were figures, the like of which 
she had never seen in all the days of her wanderings. 
They were carved out of wood, and were about the 
size of dwarfish human beings. Each of them had 
a different face, and all the faces were devilish. 
Some snarled, some frowned, some put out long 
tongues, some glared with hideous eyes of mother- 
o’-pearl ; a few — and those were the worst — laughed. 
She felt she could stand any of them but the laugh- 
ing ones. . . . Over the head of each, on the peaked 
roof of its shrine, brooded, with wings outspread 
and wicked beak bent downward, one of the night- 
mare birds. Deirdre could see now that the spirit 
of the bats was in those creatures; less in form than 
in attitude, and in masterly suggestion of some 
hidden, nameless ill. 

The moon rose higher. She could see the middle 
of the alley now, and a widely spaced row of stones 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 147 

that ran down it; black stones, large, and shaped 
like anvils. They shone a little in the moon, as if 
they had been slightly greased. She did not know 
what they were, but she liked them not at all, nor 
did she like the way in which the grinning figures 
had been placed, one opposite each stone. It was 
almost as if the hideous things had some secret 
source of amusement connected with those stones; 
as if their terrible smiles had not been carved on their 
faces by the hand of man, but had grown there, as 
the slow result of that which they had looked on 
year by year and generation by generation. For they 
were old ; the feet were rotting away with rain, and 
the edges of the shrines weathered to a fungus-grey. 
But the clear weedless spaces, and the earth about the 
stones, trampled hard as brick, showed that their 
use, whatever it might be, was not of the past. 
Light, reflected from the ground, showed enough of 
the western side of this strange avenue to suggest 
that a similar row of carved figures guarded it there 
also. Deirdre was glad she could not see their faces ; 
she felt that one side of the place was as much as 
she could endure at once. 

This, it was certain, could not be the road to the 
trader’s. Probably she had missed it running away 
from the bats. If she went back again to the beach, 
she would no doubt find it; the boy had said it could 
not be mistaken. And anyhow, if she stayed another 
minute in this inferno, she would certainly go out 
of her mind. 

Something — she could not have told what — 
prompted her to slip behind the row of figures, and 
walk down the avenue thus hidden. She had scarcely 
reached the end when she had cause to be thankful 
for the impulse. The road she had missed ran at 


148 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

right angles across the avenue. A figure came 
soundlessly along it as she was about to pass out. 

It was a native, naked, save for a boar’s tusk hung 
on his dark oily chest, and a pig’s tail threaded 
through each ear. He had the inevitable loaded 
gun on his shoulder; his right arm, curved, supported 
it by the barrel. His left arm hung down, and he 
was carelessly swinging something by his hand, as 
he walked. Deirdre took it to be a pumpkin, at 
first. But the man came on into a patch of moon- 
light, and she saw, as he crossed it, that he was 
carrying a woolly bleeding head. 

She turned as cold as the night was hot, and drew 
farther back behind the tall shrine with the bird 
on top of it. Would the man see her? And would 
he want her head if he did? Deirdre was no “ten- 
derfoot” in island life, though she had not visited 
a cannibal group before. Talk about the wild 
Western Islands flows over the Pacific in a stream 
of scandal and terror. She had heard much about 
the Solomons, the New Cumberlands, New Guinea; 
she knew that the head-hunter is not always hunting 
heads, and that it. is quite possible he may have no 
desire whatever to acquire yours. Still — one does 
not take such chances lightly. She hoped he would 
not come down the avenue, but unless he were bound 
for the trader’s, he would have to take it ; there was 
no other road. She watched him anxiously as he 
came abreast of the opening. 

What he did was not what she had expected. He 
drew aside as far as possible from the moonlit space 
bordered by the birds and the shrined figures; and 
passed it by in a curious attitude, expressive of 
reverence mixed with horror. His back was bent 
and his hands spread out, the gun, meantime, being 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


149 


cleverly balanced on his shoulder. When he had 
thus gone crouching past, he straightened himself, 
took his gun in his hand again, and turned sharply 
off into the forest, where he could be heard for some 
time cautiously breaking his way through brush and 
leaves. The sound grew fainter, and died. Deirdre 
waited till all seemed safe and quiet, and then came 
out. 

“How odd,” she breathed. “Why, he went right 
through rather than walk down the avenue.” 

Now she began to wonder if she had been right 
in coming northward. She almost thought, by the 
position of the moon, that she had overshot the 
direction of the trader’s house, and ought to have 
tried at the other end. It was not pleasant to think 
of facing those figures again, but it was a consola- 
tion to know that, by night at all events, the natives 
were even more afraid of the place than she was. 

She retraced her steps. The moon was farther 
up; one could see both sides plainly now, and the 
place looked, to her overwrought mind, twice as 
bad as before. She went right down the middle, as 
far as possible from the grinning, frowning, face- 
making figures, and did not look at them at all. She 
had to pass very near the black stones, but that could 
not be helped. Half-way down now. More than 
half. The wind had died down again, the avenue 
was very still. She could hear her tennis shoes going 
pat, pat over the sand. She smelled the mysterious 
smell of the forest, cold, sweet, heart calling. With 
it came a vague odour of something much less 
pleasant — something that dimly recalled to her hot 
evenings in suburban streets, when the butcher 
shops. . . . 

Suddenly, certainly, it came to her what the black. 


150 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

shiny stones were used for. They were braining 
stones. She had heard of them. She had heard how 
the victim of a feast was taken by his bound legs 
and swung so that his skull hit the stone with a bone- 
shattering crash. These things were done in the 
sacred dancing ground of the tribe, a spot never 
visited save on occasions of the highest ceremony, 
since it was believed — on the authority of all the 
tribal sorcerers — to be the abode of countless devils, 
which must not be approached without many and 
elaborate precautions. 

This, then, was the dancing ground. Deirdre, 
hurrying among the shrined and painted fiends, and 
the brooding bat-vulture images, with the hideous 
smell of the braining stones rising up about her, felt 
as if she had somehow died without noticing it, and 
found herself in hell. These New Cumberland na- 
tives were hardly human anyhow ; they were enough 
to make anyone believe in the regular horns and tail 
and pitchfork devils of old engravings and pictures. 
. . . How things, on opposite sides of earth, at op- 
posite ends of history, seemed to meet and mingle ! 
The small fiend looking out of the red sentry-box, 
just there where the moon fell bright, was a photo- 
graphic likeness of any theatrical Mephistopheles 
you might choose to mention. He was like Fursey 
too. Fursey and the carved fiends and the silent, 
padding thing that had crossed the glade a minute 
earlier, swinging a severed head — they were all 

linked somehow . . . somehow If one could 

understand it. They were like. . . . Good God! 
That was Mr. Conn. 

She was not so very much surprised. She had 
little capacity for surprise left in her, at the close 
of this amazing day. And Conn, who seemed to 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 15 1 


have sprung up out of the earth — Conn, looking In 
loose silk shirt and flannel trousers, just as she had 
seen him look in his own house on the top of Wawa 
Island — was so entirely natural and unalarming, in 
the midst of this alarming and unnatural place, that 
she turned to him almost as if she had met him half 
an hour before. And before she knew what she was 
saying, she had come out with, “Why are all these 
devils and natives and the bats the same sort of 
thing, and why are they all like Fursey?” 

It seemed to be characteristic of Conn that he was 
never surprised. 

“Because,” he answered her, as naturally as she 
had asked, “they really are the one thing. The bats 
and birds and fiends are the natives’ embodiment of 
the evil principle In nature. And they’re mostly evil 
themselves. And Fursey, the swine. Is bad, — clear 
through.” 

“I understand,” she said. He seemed to her very 
clever. 

“Well,” said Conn, “you’ve got to get out of this, 
quick-time; you don’t know what danger you’re in. 
I won’t ask you what you’re doing here, or — I won’t 
ask you anything till I have you safe. Come on.” 

“Where?” she asked. 

He twinkled a little. 

“That,” he said, “is my secret.” 


CHAPTER IX 

OUR secret?” asked Deirdre, the eternal 



X woman kindling in her at the thought of a 
mystery. ^^The secret?” 

*^The secret,” answered Conn. 

“But you never told anyone you never trusted — ” 

“I must trust you now; and besides, I would any- 
how. Don’t stop to talk; it’s unsafe. Follow me 
exactly, and take care of the big shell heaps, they 
might make the deuce of a noise.” 

She had not noticed them before, but she saw them 
now, in the light of the fully risen moon, bulking 
behind one row of the shrined devils — mounds and 
mounds of oyster-shells, new towards the edges of 
the dancing ground, and loosely piled; old, covered 
with bush and creepers, as they receded farther and 
farther into the forest. The size and number of 
them amazed her; it seemed as if the people of 
Meliasi must, for centuries, have gathered there to 
eat their oysters and to pile the shells together. 

“Like the ‘middens’ they make such a fuss about 
among archaeologists at home,” said Conn, who 
seemed to know what she was thinking. 

He led her a curious dance, in and out among the 
shell heaps, until they were well away from the vivid 
rays of moonlight now pouring down into the danc- 
ing ground. It grew dark and darker. An invisible 
nightbird, astonishingly close, called “Cork!” and 


152 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


153 


went off with an explosive noise of wings. Some- 
thing hissed like a steampipe. Deirdre drew closer 
to Conn; he took her hand, pressed it, and drew 
her on faster, but said nothing. She could not see 
him now; he led her, in the intense darkness of the 
forest, swinging her to right and left, half lifting 
her, now and then, over some tangle of knitted 
lianas, or helping her, with strong arm about her 
waist, to stride some giant log that barred the way. 
There was no path; she could feel that, with her 
lightly shod feet, and she wondered at his sense of 
direction. He never faltered for an instant, but led 
her, quickly and surely, for some five minutes, and 
then, with a whispered word, brought her to a halt. 
He held her hand; she felt him sinking down through 
the earth. “Keep still,” he whispered, with his head 
at her knee. In a moment he had loosed her hand 
and was gone. She heard him faintly, underneath; 
he seemed to be moving stones. “That’s right now,” 
came a soft whisper from the ground. “Take one 
step forward, and let yourself go.” 

She did with utter faith. If Conn had told her, 
she would have taken one step forward and let her- 
self go — over Niagara — ^with faith exactly the same. 
For all that she did not know it, would not know it 
yet a while, that was, indeed, what she had already 
done. 

There was an instant of sickening, unsupported 
drop, and then Conn’s arms, catching her knees, 
springing upward to her waist, and letting her down, 
with the ease of perfect strength, upon an invisible 
floor. She could not see him ; she could feel him very 
near. The breast of his silk shirt brushed against 
her face. She felt that they had left the world; 
that it was as though they had died, and were alone 


154 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


together in ultimate space. She read his mind as if 
he had spoken; she knew that he read hers, and that 
the thought between them was the same. “Lord, my 
Lord!” were the words that welled up, unspoken 
in her heart. 

Conn was the first to move. She knew that he 
drew away from her because they were alone in this 
forest, because she was solitary, unprotected, in Me- 
liasi. Nine and ninety men in a hundred, she felt, 
would have acted otherwise. Not her man. He 
rang pure gold. 

“Come on” was all that he said, tongue-tied like 
most strong men when there was much that cried for 
speech. But the brush of his long fingers, as he drew 
them from her arm, was a speech in itself. And 
Deirdre, wild, sad little gypsy, “ever roaming with a 
hungry heart,” remembered those who had snatched 
fiercely at her love; who had offered her false loves, 
false troth, who had longed, and left, and forgotten, 
in all the history of her many wanderings ; and, for- 
getting for the time, as if it had never been, the 
strangling noose that she had tied about her neck, 
she cried, silently, exultingly : 

“Here by God’s grace is the one man for me.” 

She followed, through the dark. 

In a minute, stooping and winding about, they 
came into a larger space, perceptible by the sudden 
freshness of the air. Conn stopped here, and struck 
a light. A hurricane lamp was standing on a ledge ; 
he lit it, and held it up. 

“You can speak now,” he said. “If one regiment 
of soldiers was murdering another down here, no 
one above ground would hear.” 

But Deirdre had no desire to speak. She was con- 
scious of a strange over-running calm, as if she had 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 155 

come, at last, to the end of a long, long road. She 
looked about her with interest that was incurious, 
quiet. They were standing in a good-sized cave, the 
corridor by which they had come showing behind 
them as a dark, narrow archway. The cave was in 
no way remarkable. It had walls of coral limestone, 
full of small pits and basins ; the floor was stone and 
sand. The freshness of the air showed that it had 
communication without doors, but no openings could 
be seen. 

Stacked in a corner were some tins and plates and 
a biscuit box, also a spirit lamp. Conn set about the 
business of making tea, opening tins, laying out bis- 
cuits and sheep’s tongue on enamelled iron plates, as 
if he and Deirdre had come down through the forest 
and into the cave for no other reason than a picnic. 

“You want tea,” he stated, when it was ready, and 
set it before her. They shared their meal, with 
hardly a word. The same curious calm lay upon the 
girl; she felt that nothing mattered, nothing in all the 
world since the moment when she had read this man’s 
heart. As for Conn, with his fair dry hair oddly 
ruffled, and his bright grey eyes now fixing hers, now 
avoiding them, he was like one who has found a 
treasure that he has not yet had time to examine; 
who delights, and yet is puzzled. . . . 

With an effort plain to see, he broke into common 
talk again. 

“You haven’t told me yet,” he said, “how you 
came to be wandering about Meliasi bush in the 
dark.” He was not very much surprised, it seemed. 
So many odd things happened in the New Cumber- 
lands. ... 

Deirdre told her tale. She was almost alarmed 
at the effect of that part of it which referred to Fur- 


156 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


sey. Conn’s face, in the light of the lamp, turned 
slowly, as she spoke, to a dark, dangerous red, and 
then to pale again. She saw that his hand was 
clenched upon his knee, until the knuckles stood out 
like marbles. 

“I’ll attend to Fursey,” was all that he said. Then 
he told her that he could take her, by and by, to the 
trader’s house. It was not far away; they could 
easily get there by nine o’clock. He thought she 
would be comfortable. 

“And then, of course,” he stated, “it will be easy 
for me to come and see you.” 

Deirdre, under the influence of the sweet drug she 
had swallowed, somehow, somewhen, in the course 
of the last half hour, had nothing to say. If he would 
come, he would. 

For a moment they sat silent on the floor of the 
cave, looking at one another in the diffuse thin light 
of the hurricane lamp. The same idea occurred to 
both of them. They were like. Not with any actual 
likeness of feature or expression, but with the un- 
classable resemblance known to families as “general 
family likeness.” Deirdre was almost small for a 
woman. Conn was big for a man; her face was like 
a flower with a touch of pussy-cat pansy, perhaps — 
his resembled that of a refined and good-looking 
young horse. But they were like. They sat in the 
same manner, easily cross-legged, leaning a little for- 
ward as people lean who have travelled much on 
small inconvenient boats, and learned to do without 
back-support. Conn had produced cigarettes; they 
were smoking them in the same way, with the same 
thoughtful-absent movement of the hand now and 
then, and the same slow, easy puff. And Deirdre’s 
small, long hand, with the roundish finger-ends and 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


157 


nails delicate yet strong, was of the same family as 
Conn’s. And her foot was like, in shape. And the 
shape of her thoughts was like. She knew that so 
well that she asked him, presently, savouring her 
cigarette : 

“Do you think we are related, by any chance?” 

Conn considered the matter. She had already 
found out that one of his good points lay in the fact 
that he never said, “Why?” 

“I know,” he produced. “I’ve noticed it, too. I 
think our minds are ; and mind shapes body, a good 
bit.” 

Then she asked him, a little fearfully, if he had 
had her odd experience of the hypnotic power of 
foolish little words and ordinary lines of poetry. 
She even told him about Smith’s Grammar and ex- 
amples, and the names of the mountain ranges of 
Ireland. 

“They seemed to swim in gold,” she said. “The 
gold of summer’s days — some days, the best. And 
you heard the sea in them. And it was — awfully 
silly — all that — but it took one’s life in its hands 
and made one whatever it wished.” 

She told him that she felt her heart come up into 
her throat when she thought of 

'‘There gloom the dark broad seas, my mariners!^* 

Amazed, she heard herself telling him all the 
things she had neyer thought anyone could under- 
stand. And he understood. But he put a strong 
masculine note into her music. 

“You can’t let these things run away with you,” 
he said, laying down his cigarette beside him, so that 
it smouldered and went out — one of her tricks when 
talking earnestly; she noted it. “Dreams are danger- 


158 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

ous, in the islands. Best thing is not to think of them 
as dreams; take them as facts. Not to make oneself 
egotistic. Girls are darling things, but they do take 
all their own feelings as special to themselves. Wake 
up, Deirdre.” He gave her arm a little shake. 
^‘You’re one of a class, and those are our shibbo- 
leths. I’ve got mine — ” 

“What are they?” she asked breathlessly. She 
liked the phrase “our” shibboleths. 

“Oh, trifling things.” He coloured a little. “One 
is a bit of a poem I read once in a paper — no author 
— not even sure of the words — I’ll tell you — well, 
it was when I was very young, and they wanted me 
to be a stockbroker — ^put me in the office of some 
abominable old friend of my people’s and all that — 
and I was going over on the Holyhead boat one 
winter morning; frost and a green sea, and gulls 
dipping, you know, and the cold smell of the land 
coming up ; and the dashed thing came into my head, 
don’t know where I had read it — 

“The stars are with the voyager 
Wherever he may sail, 

The .sun is constant to his time, 

The moon will never fail. 

But follow, follow, round the earth. 

The green earth and the sea. . . ** 

Couldn’t remember the last lines, but the others got 
me — just as you say — same way silly little things get 
hundreds of us^and the gulls and the green sea — 
not even green earth like the poem, but it fitted all 
the same — ^well, they were like a match thrown into 
something that had been piling up and up for ever 
so long, and it all went — ^Whiff ! So when I landed, 
I went to a hoteh and next morning I just crossed 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 159 


back to Dublin. And I told my father I wasn’t going 
to be a stockbroker, and asked him for fifty pounds. 
So he said the things they say — ” 

|Tes?’; 

“And it was fourteen steerage out to Auckland 
from London. And I’m twenty-eight now; never 
repented one second of the time and anyhow did 
better than my brothers who stayed.” 

He was lame of speech when it came to telling 
of his successes; she liked that. 

“You are rich, they all say,” she finished for him. 

“Anyhow,” he ended. “I would have done it and 
kept to it — poor.” 

“Why?” asked the girl. “Why do we?”^ 

“Because we’re the stones of Empire, little girl, 
and things are built with us. That’s why.” 

“It builds ?” 

“Yes.” 

“What is It?” 

“God knows. It’s not God, and not the devil. 
But it’s pretty near as strong.” 

“I am frightened of it,” said Deirdre after a 
pause. 

“You may be. It does cruel things to all of us. I 
daresay you know. If you don’t, you will.” 

She thought she did know. She feared, perhaps, 
she might. 

“We’re the same,” she brought out presently. 

“We go down the one road.” The words were 
burdened, heavily, with meaning. More and more 
the sweet drug, the drug that made her forget that 
cruel coil about her neck, was invading all her being. 

“One road,” she heard herself repeat. Then she 
put her hand on the floor and rose. “I must,” she 
thought dimly. 


i6o CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“What about your secret?” she asked him. 

The commonplace query broke into the rare 
moment as daylight through stained glass shattered 
by a stone. 

She saw him look at her through narrowed eyes, 
as one who senses a mystery, and then, putting it for 
the moment aside, he answered her — 

“You’re to know all that. Look round you. 
Where do you think this cave is?” 

“I couldn’t possibly guess.” 

“Under the biggest and oldest of the shell heaps. 
Where do you think it leads to?” 

“Well, it would lead to the sea, wouldn’t it?” 

“Right. We’re going to follow it.” 

He took up the hurricane lamp, and led the way. 
Deirdre was mystified. It seemed the commonest 
and most uninteresting of coral limestone caves, 
white-walled, seamed with cracks and pock-marked 
with small hollows. It was tunnel-shaped, and 
sloped a little as they went on. 

“This must lead out under the sea,” she said, re- 
membering that she had climbed no hill since leaving 
the beach. 

“It does, by and by. If it didn’t there’d be no 
secret.” He had come to a pause, and was standing 
still on the sandy floor of the cave, looking at her 
with a certain touch of mischief. “Don’t you want 
to know all about it?” he asked. The lamp flame 
wavered a little in a breath of the damp, salty 
wind that was creeping up from some unknown 
opening seaward. Conn’s sharp-cut features, in 
the dancing light, took on an odd appearance of 
grimace. 

“Tell me right from the beginning,” was her 
answer. Curiosity had waked up again; she was 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS i6i 


burning to know. All those “Conn hunts’’ she had 
heard of — all the strategies and trap-layings of Me- 
liasi, wild with cupidity; the bribing and bullying of 
natives; the “getting at” mail bags — the raid she 
herself had seen in Wawa Island — all these forces 
set against Conn’s solitary hand and head, and de- 
feated by them, time after time, and she, now, to be 
given what the whole of the New Cumberlands could 
not wrest. She had been more than woman if she 
had not felt the flattery of it. 

“The beginning,” said Conn — he swung his lan- 
tern lightly as he talked, and turned up coral twigs 
in the sand with the toe of one canvas-clad long foot 
— “the beginning is that the Meliasi natives always 
lived on oysters, till some of us came along. Oysters 
and o>ther things. Long pig sometimes. But oysters, 
anyhow; they were easy to get. Lapi-lapi, you know 
— grows in shallow water, sometimes in your depth, 
sometimes a fathom or two down. Well, lapi-lapi 
has pearls in it, some of them pretty good. White 
men didn’t come here till thirty or forty years ago. 
Natives all the time eating lapi-lapi, opening the 
shells and guzzling the oysters, and when they came 
to a nasty hard thing in one of ’em, spitting it out 
on the ground. Went on for centuries about this 
village here ; natives don’t change their ways. When 
we were cutting Charles the First’s head off, they 
were roasting their enemies on sticks here, and drink- 
ing cocoanuts, and guzzling lapi-lapi oysters, just the 
same as today. And piling up heaps and heaps of 
shells, round about the place where they had their 
ceremonial feasts. Not in the dancing grounds, you 
know, alongside of it. Begin to see?” 

“Not quite,” said Deirdre, with puzzled brow. 
“Because pearls are so easily spoiled — they must 


1 62 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


have been destroyed — a dreadful pity, I suppose, 
but—” 

“Just so. They were. When the pearlers first 
came here, they went all through the shell mounds. 
And they found heaps and baskets of pearls, some as 
big as billy-o, that the natives had spit out. And, 
of course, when the natives found that the white men 
were looking, they went through the bush, and got 
heaps more. Every one of them was spoiled. So 
the pearlers cursed everything blue, and went away 
to fish in the harbour, where, of course, the beds had 
been a bit overfished — but they get a good few all the 
same. That’s the story of the shell heaps. What 
do you think of it?” 

“Isn’t there more?” 

“There is.” Conn set down the lamp, and paused 
to light another cigarette. Deirdre felt, with the 
curious clairvoyance that seemed to attend her in 
this man’s presence, that he was clinging to the last 
rags of his long cherished secret; that regret, at the 
necessity of parting with it, mingled with the pleasure 
he felt in showing her his trust. It was a minute or 
so before he went on; but the cigarette was lighted 
and going at last, and he had no more excuse. 

“Well,” he said, speaking with his cigarette in the 
corner of his mouth — a masculine trick that she had 
always liked. ( “It makes their voices sound so casual 
and — and fascinating,” she thought.) “Well — that 
was all there was for some time. I was coffee plant- 
ing — not making a bad thing of it, but it would have 
been slow. And one day I was out in the bush here ; 
just a chance; no one ever comes that way — if white 
people want to go to see the dancing ground, the 
track’s the shortest, and the natives use it too, as far 
as the dancing ground, and then they strike right off 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 163 

into the inland forests. But I’d followed up the 
shell heaps from a sort of archseological interest. 
They led right back towards the beach, and when I 
came to the last, I saw a butterfly on one — my word, 
it was a butterfly ! The rarest we have, as big as a 
small pigeon, with gold wings, and scarlet spots in 
the middle of them, set round in black velvet; I can 
see it this minute, the way it perched on the top of 
the shell heap, opening and shutting its wings in the 
sun to dry them- — because we’d been having rain. 
And when it saw me, it flew off, strong as a bird — 
those big ones do. And I whipped off my hat and 
went hell-for-leather after it. I’ve never seen one 
since, by the way.” 

“Did you get it?” 

“What, the butterfly? No. I got a fortune in- 
stead. I came a frightful cropper, not looking where 
I was going, and was knocked half silly. Hit my 
head on a stone. And when I came round, one leg 
from the knee down was feeling so queer that I was 
quite sure it was broken. I couldn’t see it, it was in 
a tangle of creepers, so I tried to get up and stand 
on it, and down I went again. ‘Lord, I’m done for 
this time,’ I thought, for I knew if the niggers found 
me, they would roast me on a — well, never mind 
that.” For Deirdre v/as looking at him with wide, 
horrified eyes. “Where was I ? Oh, I tried to stand 
up, and fell down. And at first I thought I was 
crippled, but when my head began to get over the 
knock it had had, I suddenly realized I wasn’t, and 
that it was just a hole my leg had gone into. So I 
pulled it out, and stood up as good as new. And 
then I’d alook at the hole. It was just a sort of crack, 
with a big stone lying almost over it. I pulled off 
the stone. That was the way you came in with me 


^[164 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

a while ago. I keep the stone on it and the creepers 
trained over; the devil and all his angels couldn’t 
find it, if I didn’t choose. Well, I got in and had a 
look about. You remember, I said it had been rain- 
ing. It had, and there’d been stormy weather out- 
side. I went down all the way to the sea, and I saw 
something. It’s been raining and stormy weather 
lately, hasn’t it?” 

“Yes.” She remembered one day of furious wet 
and wind, spent at the Mission house. 

“Come on, and I’ll show you what I saw; or some 
of it. You must understand it was a lot more re- 
markable the first time. I’ll hold the light ; you come 
after.” 

They went on down the cave. The easy slope con- 
tinued. Not very far away, now, one could hear a 
dull, deadened murmur of great waters. The salt- 
smelling airs grew stronger, drew more steadily from 
the unseen sea. 

“Tide’s up,” said Conn. “We’re coming to it.” 
At the end of the long white tunnel, in the light of 
the lamp, one could see a tossing glitter. 

“Why, it’s full — there isn’t an outlet,” said the 
girl. 

“There isn’t, even when tide’s out. If there had 
been — but luckily there wasn’t. Now wait a minute.” 

He had set down the lamp, and was fumbling in 
the recesses of a rocky shelf. She heard him strike 
a match. Instantly the cave was flooded by a fierce 
acetylene flare. Everything stood out as it does in 
time-exposed photographs. The pupils and irises 
of Conn’s eyes showed as if marked round with a 
pen. The buttons on his silk shirt displayed each 
four clear, small needle holes, filled with neat stitch- 
ing. On the sand, wind-marks and the snake-like 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 165 

pencillings of hermit crabs were set in clear relief, 
You could have seen a pin — a grain of sugar. 

Conn pointed silently down; here, there, to right, 
to left. And everywhere he pointed, Deirdre saw — 
pearls. Loose pearls. Beautiful pearls, shining in 
the acetylene flare as they had never shown before, 
but as they were now to shine in the years to come 
beneath electric lights in far northern lands. They 
would lie, there, upon the breasts of lovely women; 
would hang in their ears, and glow like little moons 
and stars on their white fingers. They would be the 
cause of intrigues, the rewards of base passions, the 
gifts of truest love. They would clasp the necks of 
innocent debutantes, and dangle in rich coils down 
the waists of famous harlots. Lands and houses 
were locked up in those moony little spheres ; great 
motor cars, trained, bowing ranks of servants. The 
keys of the world lay in them. Who held as much 
of the greater pearls as his two hands could clasp, 
might fly on the wings of the wind to every 
country on earth that has called the hearts of men. 
Italy, Greece, India, Japan, Paris and Rome, Madrid, 
Vienna, New York, the Taj Mahal, the Pyramids, 
California, the Rio Grande, the silent reaches of the 
Amazon, the thunders of the Horn — all, all, were 
clasped in the tiny rounds, of the shining trivial 
things that lay scattered like drops of hail on the 
cave floor. 

Deirdre was imaginative; she had the artist’s 
soul. She took it in with one glance, and the wonder 
made her feel faint. 

It was as if she had been shown in a single instant 
“the kingdoms of the earth, and the glory of them.” 

“Why,” she said at last, “you must be far, far 
richer than anybody thought. You must be a mil- 


1 66 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


lionairel” And she felt a little, selfish pang of 
regret. No woman who loves desires her man to be 
too rich. She senses rivalry, in the tremendous power 
of gold. 

Conn did not answer. Bent over the sandy floor, 
he was busying himself as, perhaps, no man save he 
had ever, since the beginning of the world, been 
busied. He was scooping up pearls with both hands 
from the ground; gathering them in as one gathers 
berries fallen from a tree. Many of them were small, 
some very small ; many were yellowed and off colour, 
others irregular in shape. But every here and there, 
among the wind-ripples of the sand, lay a pearl as 
big and as round as a pea; once in a way he would 
find a pear-shaped gem ; and just once, stooping over 
a hollow made by a little drip from the roof of the 
cave, he found, nested in it like the egg of some fairy 
bird, a pearl of oval shape, clear, shining, and an 
inch at least in length. He held it up silently. It 
was Deirdre who screamed. 

“Yours,” he said, and put it In her hand. 

“Oh, I couldn’t,” she cried. “It’s worth a for- 
tune.” It seemed marvellous to her, feeling the 
small cold thing In her fingers, that this accidental 
bit of an oyster should have power to make secure, 
until old age and death, the life of anyone who 
owned It. All necessity of labour, of anxiety, of 
planning for holidays, or “managing” without things 
one wanted, all fears of anything In the long list of 
human woes that money could prevent or cure, would 
be wiped out forever. If she but kept hold of this 
little, cold smooth object In her hand. What fairy 
tale was stranger? 

But one could not do such things, even when one 
had only three hundred a year, and was anxious 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 167 

about interest and investments. She knew that 
women, good women, some of them, did take pres- 
ents of jewels and jewellery from men. She knew 
that many of her acquaintance would have thought 
a year’s scheming and planning none too long, if they 
could, at the end of it, have extorted in any possible 
manner just such an offer as she had listened to. 
She knew Conn meant it; and that there was no 
string tied to the offer; no recompense understood. 
Yet. . . . 

The instinct of the thoroughly decent woman — 
and Deirdre was a Celt — runs strongly, even vio- 
lently, against the taking of valuables from men. 
There is, in her mind, but one thing possible to give 
in exchange. She did not reason about that; she 
did not know why the pull of the slip-knot round her 
neck became suddenly perceptible once more, this 
time with the cruellest tug it ever had given her. 
She only turned a little white, and held out the pearl 
in her curved palm, guarding it as she held it — one 
must be careful with a thing of such great price. . . . 

“Please do take it,” she said. 

Conn, straightening up, with his fists full of pearls, 
looked at her, and saw she meant it. For some 
reason undefined, he grew as pale as she. But he 
spoke in a commonplace tone. 

“Why, of course, if you would rather not — hold 
on a minute till I put these away.” 

He worked a small leather bag out of a pocket 
with one unoccupied finger, and began spilling the 
pearls into it. 

They went in with a delicious cold rattling sound. 
Deirdre found herself completely human and cove- 
tous as she listened to that pattering of magic rain. 
She would have liked, dearly, to own the power, the 


1 68 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


ease, it represented. And yet she was disappointed 
that Conn was rich ! . . . 

When the bag was almost filled, and his hands 
were emptied. Conn took the big pearl from her. 
He had not asked her to accept it a second time. 
She felt the wrench at her heart that any woman 
would have felt as she watched the wondrous thing 
disappear. Conn tied the bag up, and placed it in 
a recess of the cave wall. 

“I don’t take them home when I’m going by the 
ordinary track route,” he explained. ‘‘Not safe. 
Some of Fursey’s lot might surround me and go 
through me. I dive out through the water at the 
end and swim to an open place where I leave my 
boat. The boys think I’m out for a swim.” 

He was scanning the cave floor as he spoke, 
searching with stooped head for any stray gem that 
might have escaped his harvesting. “A fair crop 
this time,” he said, straightening up. 

“Crop? Do you get them every time?” 

“I wouldn’t if I didn’t choose the right time, of 
course. After high winds and rain. It’s a chance 
in a million, one way you look at it, that the things 
should have escaped in that particular fashion. And 
yet not so wonderful after all. Perhaps it’s hap- 
pened in other places, only nobody knows. You see, 
pearls are delicate things, and all the nigs let fall on 
the ground got weathered and spoiled — all that 
stopped there, that is.” 

“But just about the neighbourhood of the shell 
heaps there are any number of little cracks ; sort of 
thing you do find on soil that’s made up of decayed 
coral, you know. And lots of the pearls went down 
the cracks. Now that wouldn’t have helped them, 
much, if they’d only landed in the dirt and mess of a 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 169 

common cave floor. But they didn’t. Heaps of ’em 
stopped in the cracks. Well — in stormy, windy 
weather, the spray beat into those cracks — not at any 
other time — and the pearls got a bath of sea-water 
often enough to keep them all right. Then when it 
rained, the cracks were flooded from above, and they 
got swept down, every time, into this cave, which is 
clean and salty, not like the other ones, and there 
they stopped.” 

“How was it they didn’t get washed out to the 
end where the water is, or carried away by spray in 
high tides?” 

“The rain sank through the sand mostly, and 
where it didn’t it trickled down to that little break- 
water of rock you see, and damned up and ran over. 
But the pearls stopped. Like the riffles in a sluice 
box. Fact is, the whole cave is a sort of sluice box, 
only it sluices pearls instead of gold. Everywhere 
there is a kink in the sand, or a little bar of rock, 
the pearls collect. You should have seen it the first 
time. Now I only get what has come down since the 
last visit I’ve made, and that’s getting less and less 
ever time ; some day it’ll peter out altogether. But 
the day I found it — ^brought a lamp down to have a 
look; didn’t expect anything more than just a cave 
like any other — and when I came along here, and 
held up the lamp — well, it didn’t match my acetylene 
flare, but it showed something the flare never got a 
chance to. I swear the place was fairly payed with 
pearls. Like something in the Arabian Nights. I 
wallowed in ’em. I hopped about like a kid, and 
sang things, and then I was afraid somebody might 
hear me — didn’t know the place as well as I know 
it now — and I knocked off, and started to crawl 
among the pearls and scoop ’em up. Then I’d noth- 


lyo CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


ing to put them in, so I took off my undershirt, and 
tied them up in that, and buttoned my shirt again, 
and when I was crossing the track to get back to the 
beach, if I didn’t come across a wTole gang from 
Meliasi who’d been out at the trader’s. And they 
asked me what I’d been looting. And I gave the 
bundle a hitch under my arm, and said, ‘Pearls, old 
chap,’ to the man who’d asked me. It looked like 
pearls — a lump of a parcel you could have put a 
turkey in! ‘Well, if you won’t tell, you won’t,’ 
says he sulkily; he was more than half drunk, and I 
cut on without any more talk to the beach, and when 
I got alongside of my boat, I heaved the bundle at 
the cox’n as if it was old boots, and then hopped in 
myself, and we shoved off. And the gang stood on 
the beach, and asked each other was it curios or 
kai-kai (food), that I was so disobliging about. 
They were dead sure it was something I’d been loot- 
ing from the natives. Of course, when I began to 
show up my hand a bit, a year or so after, they ought 
to have remembered that, but they didn’t, it was too 
simple and ordinary for them. And they never saw 
me about these parts again. I took care of that. It’s 
only a matter of starting a good way off, and work- 
ing through the bush. Sometimes, just for fun, I’ve 
started off when I knew I’d be seen, and led them 
the devil of a chase ten miles from here. They are 
pretty sick of their Conn hunts now, I reckon.” 

“Aren’t you afraid of their getting at the thing 
through what you send away? Or do you send 
it?” 


I 


“Oh, Lord, yes — ^been sending to a decent old Jew I 
chap in Melbourne ever since I found the place. ! 
Well, to answer you — did they find anything when 
you saw them loot my house?” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


171 

“I heard them swearing because they had only got 
some beads and trade belts.” 

Conn laughed the odd soundless laugh that was 
so peculiarly his. 

“I banked on their stupidity when I put those belts 
In. They’re not belts in reality. Of course we do 
trade with all sorts of gaudy stuff; but those strips 
of blue and yellow velvet are for testing the colour 
of the pearls with. You lay them on th^e stuff, and 
if a white pearl looks pure white on the blue, it’s a 
damned good one, because, of course, the blue 
tends to make it look yellow. And if you can 
make a medium coloured one look all right on 
the yellow — really, the shade is more cream — it 
will do. But if it looks yellow, it’s not worth send- 
ing down — from my point of view — unless it 
happens to be very big. And about the beads. 
Why, they found my pearls — had them In their 
hands. The lot I am sending down next boat were 
inside the beads.” 

“Inside! But how — ?” 

“Easy enough. The old boy in Melbourne sends 
them up to me ready prepared, common looking big 
trade beads with a gilt or a coloured stripe round 
them. There’s a join under the stripe. I’ve some 
neat little tools I use in detaching the halves ; chloro- 
form, too, to melt the special cement. Then I pack 
a pearl or two In each, and cement them up again, 
and smooth off. As for the very big ones, I put them 
into the lumping big beads the nigs sling round their 
necks like a locket.” 

“Aren’t you afraid they may get them in the mall 
bags some time ? Or mightn’t they wonder why you 
send down beads?” 

Conn doubled over with laughter this time. 


172 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

“It is such a game/’ he said, wiping his eyes. 
“Why, Fursey sends them for me I” 

“What!” 

“Fact, as I’m alive. He trades a good bit in ivory 
nuts; nice clean things, and always carefully sewn 
up in bags. Well, the man who buys them is the 
man who buys my pearls. Fursey thinks he got a 
mighty bargain out of him when he screwed him for 
a shilling or two a bag above market price, -and got 
him to sign a contract based on a false market re- 
port. It was put up between the Jew and me, to 
make sure the nuts went to the same market all the 
time. And every now and then a bag has a string or 
two of beads in it. If the bags were to meet with 
an accident, it would be only the loss of a few pearls 
to me, not the loss of the whole show — ^because no 
one would think the beads anything but a mistake, or 
perhaps they might think a nig had stolen them, and 
planted them there. Do you see?” 

“I do, but I can’t imagine how you get them into 
the bags; do you get a native to do it?” 

“Not much! No, no one in the world but myself 
and the Jew — and you — ^knows — or suspects any- 
thing about it. There’s no great difficulty after all; 
I wait for a dark night, and put on khaki and get into 
the store on the wharf; of course, the lock is a com- 
mon one. And I undo the stitching of a bag or two, 
and slip the beads in, and put my private mark on 
them, and sew them up; use a dark lantern to do 
it, but anyhow I can work by feeling. Fursey and 
his gang get at the chap who makes up the mail bag 
— we have a kind of amateur post office — and steam 
my letters; and they cut open a parcel with a pair of 
boots to be soled, and run pins in all over the boots — 
I’ve seen the marks. And anything at all I send 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


173 


south by any chap on the steamer — orchids for a 
friend, or a bag of those mangoes I have, or stuffed 
birds — well, they go all through it, and rip every- 
thing up. I know. And all the time — ” He bent 
over with the shaking soundless laugh again. 

Deirdre stood amazed. This was the man who 
had kept his secret, at the risk of his life, from all 
the island world, who might, if he liked, have kept 
the greater part of it even from her! And he had 
not said a word — not a single word — about secrecy. 
He had not once asked her to keep the matter to 
herself. 

She knew she could not have done it. No matter 
how much she trusted anyone, she would have found 
it impossible to refrain from just one little warning 
— a mere word — “I know it’s unnecessary to ask 
you ... of course I trust you perfectly. . . .” 
And in the act of expression, the trust would have 
been smeared and spoiled. 

He did not say the word, give the warning. Not 
while they were in the cave, nor while he was lead- 
ing her back to the opening in the forest, climbing 
up to see that all was clear, and helping her through 
the hole on to firm ground above. No.r yet while 
they were walking, through bush well lights now 
by a high-sailing moon, to the open track and the not 
far-off house of the trader. He talked not at all, in 
fact, for, as he had hinted to her in the cave, it was 
dangerous to be found by any of the cannibal na- 
tives, wandering at night in the neighbourhood of 
their sacred places. But when they had all but 
reached the little tin hut near the beach, where Car- 
bery, the trader, lived with his white wife, he loioked 
at her, half mischievously, in the clear moonlight, 
and laid one finger, for a moment, on her lips. And 


174 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

then or thereafter, that was all the warning that he 
gave. 

But all night long, after she had been introduced 
to Mrs. Carbery, had gone to bed, had seen the 
moon climb round from one side of her stretched 
mosquito net to the other, and heard the tide ebb 
out and out down the beach, turn and come back and 
wash beneath the walls — she lay awake, hands 
folded, eyes open wide, feeling, hour after hour, the 
strange light kiss of his finger on her lips. And she 
remembered — and wondered whether Conn had not 
remembered too, for all he said he had forgotten — 
the last two lines of the little wander song — 

“For love is with the lover’s heart 
Wherever he may be.” 


CHAPTER X 


I T was a strange house of the Carberys’, and a 
strange life that Deirdre led there. 

Inanimate things in the New Cumberlands had a 
way of looking more or less alive; of suggesting 
strange comparisons. The township of Meliasi was 
like a company of frightened houses running away 
from the terrors of the forest to take refuge in the 
sea. The black, unknown hill ranges that lay behind 
took on the forms of lurking beasts of prey; one lay 
crouched backed like a puma on the spring; another 
drove head down, and horrible great shoulders 
heaved, as one imagines the fearsome shapes of 
bisons in museums must have gone, when they were 
alive and fiery-eyed. And Carbery’s place, taking on 
the strange characteristics of this strangest of all 
lands, looked, to Deirdre, like a little white house 
that had poised desperately on the edge of deep 
water to -drown itself, but had never got up courage 
to leap in. It was a lost-looking house, with wide 
glassy eyes staring under its narrow verandah, and a 
ladder that fell from its door like a panting tongue. 
You went round a point of land to find it, and you 
found it where you did not expect, right on the verge 
of the shore that had come up to meet you again. 
There was no particular road to it; you plunged out 
of the bush, and went along the sand, and there it 
was on its high piles, hanging over a deep inlet on one 
175 


176 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

side, looking on the beach with the other. The sea 
beat, blue and green, below its door, and there were 
palm trees, with thin dancing shadows, and the wind 
always blew, and always swept the tinkling twigs of 
coral down the empty beach, where the sun, in de- 
fiance of astronomic laws, seemed always to be set- 
ting, low and gold. So, at least, Deirdre remem- 
bered it, in days to come. 

She remembered, too, that the lonesomeness, the 
fara-wayness, of the place were beyond all telling. 
White people never seemed to come there — except 
one — natives came, often, but they were- sullen, 
silent, and half-scared, like all the New Cumberland 
folk. They made their bargains with Carbery — a 
ton of copra for a rusty old gun; sacks -on sacks lof 
fungus and ivory nuts for one bottle of the fiery gin 
sold by the traders. They stood about the store on 
the beach for a minute or two, bands of them, naked, 
oiled and tattooed, with fierce eyes ringed round in 
black paint; carrying bundles of poisoned arrows in 
their hands, -which they would scarcely lay down to 
inspect Carbery’s goods, or to unload the bundles 
that they carried for sale. Business concluded, they 
backed away into the forest, watching, cannily, not 
only the trader, but his wife and Deirdre, lest some 
treachery -at the hands of the mistrusted whites 
should be suddenly loosed upon them. Then there 
would follow days when no one came, when the wind 
blew and blew, and the sea crashed under the house, 
and small white crabs went spinning down the beach 
so fast that one thought they were only skeleton 
leaves blown seaward, and nothing happened at all, 
for ever and ever. 

Carbery was a man without any particular charac- 
teristics, or any marked nationality; he accepted 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


177 


Deirdre’s board-money, but never let her know, by 
word or sign, whether she was welcome in his house, 
or the reverse. Deirdre thought, on the whole, that 
he took drugs, but she was not always sure. Mrs. 
Carbery was an Irishwoman of the most Celtic type, 
given to fits of a sort of exalted melancholy, and full 
of strange fancies and beliefs. She spent much of 
her time fortune-telling — with cups, with cards, with 
signs from the bush, the birds, the sea — anything, 
everything — for herself, for her husband, who took 
not the smallest interest, for Deirdre, whenever 
Deirdre would let her. 

“Ye are down-hearted, gurl,” she told her. “Lis- 
ten now, ye have no call to be, for whatever’s the 
trouble, the cards spoke well last night and ye have 
only to wait.” 

“I’m not down-hearted a bit: I don’t know what 
you mean. I’m enjoying myself lots,” retorted Deir- 
dre, who had gone with the silent Carbery, a day 
before, to see some marvellous native dances in a hill 
village, and returned loaded — vicariously — with 
amazing curios. “I’m seeing things hardly anybody 
has seen. Did you ever go to the drum-dance — 
where they dance with live pigs on their shoulders ? 
It’s—” 

“Your card kem up in the middle of the pack,” 
flowed on Mrs. Carbery. “And the card with the 
ship, that manes sorrow when the dark side is turned 
to ye — ^this time it was for joy, though all the other 
times it has been for the black, black sorrow. I 
niver told ye that, but daughter of Airyan it has 
me heart scalded all the time since you came, that 
the black side was always forninst ye. Ye be to have 
had throuble, gurl, and maybe it’s not run out yet.” 

“Everyone has trouble,” fenced Deirdre, feeling 


178 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

the drag of the half-forgotten noose anew. She had 
more than her share just then, it seemed to her, 
noose or no noose. Conn had been to see her once, 
and not again. It was time — quite time — for him to 
have found his way over to Carbery’s a second time, 
if he really wanted to. But the wind had blown and 
the tinkling corals danced away down the beach, and 
the ghostly little crabs blown about like leaves, day 
after day, and evening had filled the beach and bay 
with flooding melancholy sunsets that seemed des- 
tined to end all things, each time they came — and still, 
still. Conn of the Hundred Fights had kept away. 

Mrs. Carbery’s fortune-tellings, foolish though 
they seemed, in reality raised her spirits somewhat; 
but she did not feel inclined for talk that afternoon. 
She felt she had to wander out yet once more along 
the wind-blown* beach, to look for the twentieth time 
round -the corner of the point, to assure herself, 
again, that there really was nobody, nobody at all, 
coming .out .O/f the bush. 

And behold, there was someone ! 

Her heart jumped up, and then went down — not 
quke all the way. It was not Conn, it was a white 
man, tallish, very slim, astonishingly well dressed, 
lightly bearded — Des Roseaux, in fact, the French 
Commissioner, whom she had met, once, at the Mis- 
sion island. She knew him for a gossip. He was 
more welcome in that character than he could have 
been in any other. Surely, he would have something 
or -other to tell that would throw light. . . . 

Des Roseaux had. Seated on Carbery’s verandah, 
pretending, with French courtesy, to like his host’s 
fierce rum, which had assuredly never seen the Ja- 
maica it bore on its label, Des Roseaux flirted, de- 
terminedly and naively, with Deirdre — which she 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


179 


did not mind in the least — and between times poured 
out all the gossip of Meliasi and the harbour islands, 
like a walking newspaper. 

She waited for Conn’s name. She felt it was com- 
ing. It did. 

“We are all delighted,” declared Des Roseaux, 
“ravished, that Mr. Conn has got off so well. You 
will have heard, without doubt, Mademoiselle, of his 
attack on that confoundable beast, Fursey. It was 
a little rough, but they say Fursey had breaked into 
his house, and has stole some of his goods. There 
is a whisper — but let’s be discreet. I not whisper it. 
He had cause enough, assuredly, for what he has 
done.” 

“What was that?” a^ked Deirdre, a little anx- 
iously. She did not understand. 

Mrs. Carbery had joined them, and was standing 
on the verandah in a tragic-muse attitude — not in the 
least affected, but natural — one hand set on the table, 
the other flung down and back. Her hair was more 
than commonly dishevelled by the wind, and she had 
forgotten to take off her cooking apron. She, also, 
listened, but with the air of one to whom earthly 
affairs were not more important than one might 
imagine they were to the inhabitants of Mars. 

“You have certainly heard about it,” answered 
Des Roseaux incredulously. “No? You have not 
heard that Fursey has been caught, who was stealing 
some things in Conn’s house, and that Conn has 
veritably given him the father and mother of a 
beating?” 

Des Roseaux’s English, at times, displayed 
strange lapses, of which he was simply unconscious. 
But Deirdre was too anxious to laugh. 

“What has he done?” she asked. She scented 


i8o CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


trouble ahead. Was there nothing but trouble In the 
world ? 

“I will tell It to you. He has first fought ^his 
Fursey — ” 

“Fursey,” remarked the man Carbery, looking 
through the bedroom door, “can beat his weight in 
wild cats.” And immediately went away. 

“It’s true,” allowed Des Roseaux, “but Conn, to 
what I think. Is all the same his weight in wild leop- 
ards. And he has got better ‘of Fursey, though my 
word, they have had a fight. Then, Conn, he has 
said, so the boys tell, ‘You are licked’ to Fursey, 
‘and now I will lick you proper,’ and he has took 
his stingaree tail — ” 

“Oh!” The cry was from Deirdre. She had not 
lived In the Island world without knowing what a 
stingaree tail could do. 

“And he has cut that Fursey .to a ribbon. And 
Fursey, he sings out — what do you call it — and all 
the time now and then Conn he say — ‘Sing, damn 
you, sing till I tell you to stop.’ It is as if he is mad. 
Fursey has been howling like a dog, and all the time 
all the more Conn he tell him, ‘You sing very well;’ 
he tell him, ‘Now sing some more.’ So it arrived 
that by and by the boys they are very much fright- 
ened, and they run and fetch Mr. Blackbury — ” 

“Where did it all happen?” gasped Deirdre. 

“In Mellasi, as I have told you (he had not), 
right In the street. Oh, I am not finish yet. It’s 
magnificent. Mr. Blackbury he came running, and 
when he came. Conn laughed and he has thrown 
down the stingaree tail, and he says: “Take that 
thing to the Mission, and maybe, if they are good 
Christian, they will nurse It, and keep It out of hell 
a little while.’ And then Blackbury, he begin to talk. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS i8i 


Name of a name, Blackbury can talk! And If Conn 
cut Fursey to ribbon with his stingaree, then Black- 
bury do the same to Conn with his tongue. For why, 
he was intentioning to have Fursey deported on the 
next man-of-war, and now he say Fursey have a case, 
and why will the man-of-war listen to me when I 
talk? And he say very many things about the bad- 
ness of Conn. So Conn stand there planted in the 
dust, and he look, very still, with that white-lire look 
he have, and he says: ‘Mr. Blackbury, have you 
finished quite?’ Blackbury makes a nod. Then 
Conn stands up very straight, after his fashion — ” 

Des Roseaux imitated it. Deirdre, listening with 
her heart still oddly out of place, and her hands turn- 
ing cold, could see the whole scene — could see Conn, 
with the “white fire” in his face and eyes, standing 
ever prostrate, beaten Fursey like St. George over 
the dragon, not once excusing himself, because he 
would not drag her name into the dust of the fight. 

“And he says, ‘Then I will tell you, you would 
have done it yourself.’ And Blackbury who’s mt 
any fool, cock his eye at him — so” — Des Roseaux 
mimicked cleverly — “and he says — ‘I would have 
done it myself, and why?’^ Conn look at him with 
that stare he have and he is shouting out at the top 
of his voice — ‘Because Fursey have broken into my 
house, and open my safe. That is the why.’ ‘You 
have no other reason?’ says Blackbury. ‘Oh,’ say 
Conn, ‘he has tried to kill me some time. I remember 
now.’ ‘And me, I remember,’ Blackbury is saying. 
‘No, but I will not denounce you to the man-of-war, 
when she come. But this conduct in the public 
street, -it goes too far; you shall pay me a fine.’ 
Conn say he have no right to make fines, but John- 
Bull-Blackbury, he nod his big bull head, and he say 


1 82 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


— ‘Right or no right, I will not have this; I shall fine 
you ten pounds for the new wharf.’ Then Conn, 
he say, ‘Right, sir,’ and he put his hand into the 
pocket of Fursey, and pull out some nugget of gold. 
‘Here, then, are you robbing the man?’ says John 
Bull. ‘Yes, I am robbing him of that .he robbed me,’ 
Conn is saying, and out he take six big nugget. 
‘Bait for fools,’ he say, and he give them to Black- 
bury. ‘That is ten’ he say, and then he feel again, 
and take out more. ‘That Is the last, and It shall 
be the fine for the next.time, which I pay in advance,’ 
he says. And all the time, Fursey lie half dead. 
‘Conn, my boy, you will make a spoon or spoil a horn, 
but anyhow I think you will never make old bones,’ 
says Blackbury, and he drop the gold in his pocket 
and saves himself.” 

Deirdre had listened with forced calm. She felt 
sick as the story went on. What was to come of it? 
And why had not Conn — oh — the Frenchman was 
speaking again. 

“But you will forgive me, I’ve forgotten — Mr. 
Conn has entrust me with a letter. At your service. 
Mademoiselle.” He bowed as he handed Deirdre 
an envelope unlike the usual island stationery, which, 
as all the Pacific world knows. Is scratchy grey out- 
side, and lined “correspondence block” within. This 
was thick, rough-edged, and creamy-white, and the 
paper and envelope matched. It had a heavy black 
heading Inside — “WAWA, NEW CUMBER- 
LANDS.” So Deirdre saw when, asking pardon, 
she opened the letter. There might be an answer 
to send. . . . 

“Well, what a letter,” saia her mind. With her 
lips, she said, “There’s no answer; thank you very 
much for bringing It,” adding Inaudibly, “Now do 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 183 

go away like a good man, and let me read it 
again.” 

Perhaps Des Roseaux, like a true Frenchman, 
guessed. At any rate, he stayed not very much 
longer. He had business, he explained, on the other 
side of ‘the point; there was a French trader there 
whom he wished to see. They would all hope to 
see Mademoiselle in Meliasi soon, and the British 
Commissioner’s whaleboat, as well as his own, were 
entirely at her disposal. 

Deirdre, free, made at once for her room, fol- 
lowed by an entirely understanding remark from 
Mrs. Carbery — “Daughter of Airyan, it bid to be 
the ship card did it after all !” Sitting on her bed, 
she re-read the letter. 

It was without beginning or end. 

has g^ot some of what he deserved. I shall see you 
in a week from today. 

'‘Stephen Conn.” 

“There’s a good deal of voltage about that,” she 
commented, studying the letter, — if such it could be 
called. She had not roamed the world for nothing. 
She knew, as the wise woman knows, that the man 
who writes in sentences like hammer strokes is the 
man who expends himself in action. It is the weaver 
of beautiful words who hangs back at a pinch. 

Besides — ^the form of the letter showed thought 
for her. If lost or mislaid, it contained nothing to 
start gossip, in spite of all that was between the 
lines. Deirdre made no mistake about that. She 
knew what Conn was coming for, as well as if he 
had written ten sheets to say. 

And now, for the first time in her life, temptation 
assailed her seriously. Why tell him? 


1 84 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


She had found the man; she had met her fate. 
The poppy-flower of her love for Adrian Shaw had 
bloomed and had its day, a brief day at best; nor 
had it been so very hard for her — after all — to pluck 
it up by the roots and cast it out. But this — this — 
was a growing tree. The wrench of tearing it out 
from the hold it had taken — even so soon — was 
more than she could bear to think of. Conn was 
life ; the meaning of life. What would be left if she 
sent him away? She understood, now, what had 
been left when she dismissed the other man. There 
had always been, subconsciously, the feeling that, 
after all, it was not the end. The horizon had not 
closed down; the road by which the Prince might 
come lay still open. Now, he was here. If he went, 
there was no future any more. Life without hope — 
how did people bear it? 

Some of them did not bear it. She understood 
that now. She had never understood before. 

The house was unendurable. She went out on 
to the beach, and found a place where nobody could 
see her — had there been anyone — and where she 
could see nothing but the thin palm trunks, curving 
like flower stems all round her, and the blue and 
green of the sea inlaid between. There she sat 
down, on the clinking coral shale, and put her head 
in her hands, and thought and thought. . . . 

Why tell him? What was she to do? Was she 
to go on wandering for ever — “ever roaming with 
a ^hungry hept,” shut off from all that made life 
worth the living? Was that wretched piece of 
schoolgirl folly to hang round her neck, like a diver’s 
necklace of Jead, for ever, always dragging her down 
to sunless solitary depths ? She could not understand 
how It was that she was the same creature as that 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 185 

priggish, bookish girl, how It came about that she 
must suffer for the idiot’s faults. Idiot, trebly-dyed ! 
What had Rogers, her student “husband,” really 
been like? She could hardly remember now. Dark, 
rather; tall, rather; romantic and .ill-balanced with 
his half-cooked Socialism and his high-flown gal- 
lantry; hard set, she remembered, against the very 
Idea of a certain smug Government post that his 
people were keeping warm for him; wearing red 
ties, and inclined to vegetarianism and woman’s 
suffrage. She had not had the faintest affection for 
him; but she remembered a certain vague kindness, 
born of gratitude, that had caused her to regret — 
at first — his mysterious disappearance. It had all 
worn out long before Shaw took the trouble of in- 
vestigating the matter. She recalled how hard she 
had had to fight against feeling frankly disappointed 
that he wasn’t dead. A few weeks after she had 
written to the asylum doctor, asking him to let 
her know “if any change occurred.” He had 
acknowledged her note, briefly, almost rudely.^ Since 
then — nothing. She knew Rogers would live for 
ever. Lunatics always did. 

“Why don’t they set one free, then?” she had 
asked Adrian Shaw that day In Camacho’s court- 
yard. 

“There are two reasons,” Shaw had answered, be- 
coming the lawyer at once. “First, because it would 
open the way to collusion between parties who 
wished to separate. A stay In an asylum could 
always be arranged. . . . Then, no doctor can say 
for certain that a lunatic cannot possibly recover. 
Some new discovery In medicine may take place. 
The X-Rays cured a good many hopeless cases — 
showed that the trouble was really a surgical matter. 


1 86 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


There might be something else tomorrow. And 
anyhow, mental practice is full of surprises.” 

“Don’t some countries give divorce for lunacy?” 

“Quite a number. I think myself that we should. 
But that has nothing to do with your case. We must 
take the laws as they stand. Damn them!” 

How well she remembered it all — the cold, pro- 
fessional voice expounding, the sudden break into 
a very human warmth and indignation, the wretched 
silence that followed. . . . Over long ago, all that. 
Over, as the mad days in Dublin were over and dead. 
But their results remained; the seeds sown by them 
had come up and flourished. And she had to reap. 

“I will not,” she suddenly cried, to the palms and 
the empty sea. “Why should I spoil my life ? What 
possible sin do I commit, if I say nothing?” 

“Bigamy,” said a small voice within her. “Some- 
thing one can be sent to penal servitude for.” 

“There’s nobody here to send -one to penal servi- 
tude,” she answered the voice. “And bigamy’s only 
a name. Just as .the marriage was only a name. I 
am not married. Anyhow,” she thought, rising and 
turning her face towards the mad little house that 
had run down to drown itself in the sea, and hesi- 
tated for ever on the verge, “there’s no reason at all 
to worry about it — now, I haven’t been asked by 
anyone to marry him. And I won’t think about it 
for another minute.” 

Long, yet short, was that week during which she 
waited for Conn — knowing well that he had chosen 
to give the whispers about her and Fursey and his 
own part in the drama full time to blow over before 
coming to see her again. Mrs. Carbery enlivened 
the days now and then with bursts of fortune-telling, 
in which she professed to see a dark man who stood 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 187 

across Deirdre’s path, a fair man who loved her, 
dangers threatening, fortunes hanging — In the bal- 
ance-all the old stock-in-trade of the prophetess, 
yet curiously appropriate. She found Deirdre one 
day under the palm trees crying. She did not ask 
her what was the matter ; -It appeared she knew — 
without any foolish preliminary of asking. 

“Daughter of Alryan,” she remarked philosoph- 
ically, “what does It matter? What does anything 
matter? Answer me that?” 

“It matters a lot when you can’t marry the man 
you like,” answered Deirdre, stung Into candour sur- 
prising even to herself. But Mrs. Carbery was not 
surprised. 

“Not at all,” was her reply, given In the usual 
tragic-prophetess attitude. “Sure, not at all. Or 
har’ly anything at all. Gurl, do ye think anny of us 
does?” 

“I — I don’t know. I never looked at it like that.” 

“Then I can tell ye. No wan does. Do ye think 
I did? Or that Sassenach bull on the Governmin’ 
Island? Did yer mother or yer father? They did 
not. Nor will you. Sure the cards would tell It, If 
nothin’ else did. But it doesn’t need the cards, 
daughter. Ye can read it In the worruld.” 


“It’s a good game,” said Blackbury, laying down 
his cards. “Bridge they call it? There’s your nlne- 
and-six; you’d double your salary pretty soon If you 
played me every night.” 

“No, sir; you’d beat me. You pick it up won- 
derfully.” 

“Gatehouse,” said the Commissioner, unmoved, 
“you are a little bit of a liar; but not more than a 


i88 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


secretary should be. I’m rather slow over It. Conn 
there picks it up like a pigeon picking up peas.” 

“Mr. Conn seems to pick up everything that’s 
going,” observed the Secretary, shuffling the pack. 

There was a double meaning in the words. Conn 
showed that he saw it; his hard, sea-grey eyes fixed 
themselves on Gatehouse, with an expression trans- 
latable as “You and I will have a talk together, one 
of these days.” What the Commissioner saw or 
did not see, no one could tell. 

It was another of the white, windy nights familiar 
In MellasI, well known to wanderers over the South 
Sea World. The south-easter — never known as the 
“trade” in local speech — ^was hard at work crashing 
the palm heads together, slatting and booming among 
the verandah blinds till a blind man might have sup- 
posed the Residency was a ship, hard put to it to 
make port in the midst of a heavy gale. The three 
men who, with Des Roseaux, had just finished their 
game of cards, were sitting silent, all of them smok- 
ing, all of them thinking the “long, long thoughts” 
of the island world. 

Des Roseaux spoke first. 

“I see them almost,” he said. 

“Who?” was Gatehouse’s natural reply. 

“All those women. Those women which we love.” 

“Who loves them, and why?” asked Blackbury 
somewhat drily, pipe in one corner of his mouth. 
His hair, darkish, mixed with grey, and curly, stood 
up a little, just as John Bull’s hair stands in Tenniel’s 
immortal drawings. His broad, shaven cheeks, 
backed by narrow whiskers, were curved into the 
least of smiles, showing wonderfully perfect teeth. 
Again, one missed the top-boots and the bull-dog; 
one felt they ought to have been there. . . . 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 189 

Des Roseaux went on. 

“Never I see some men like this, who sit silent, 
who think, think, in some place far away from the 
home, but I see, also, the woman each man think 
about. On the deck of ships IVe seen them, many 
a time, those women who walk like ghosts, thin, as 
glass, so that the sun or the moon shine through. 
No, I haven’t known who they are, but I see them. 
Now, on this floor” — he pointed dramatically to the 
empty space of verandah boarding — “there walk, 
unseen, four women, beautiful, sad, that the thoughts 
of us four men have create — ” 

“Granted the beauty, how do you know they’re 
sad?” asked Blackbury, round the stem of his pipe. 

“Because we, all of us, are far away,” was Des 
Roseaux’s answer. 

“Not good enough. They might be glad. They 
might have forgotten,” said the Commissioner 
lightly. 

“Ah no, my friend, it is sure that those four 
women — I mean the four that rises into our minds 
all of us when I speak, for no doubt there are others 
too — ” 

“No doubt, Don Juan.” 

“It is sure that those four will remember us, be- 
cause woman remembers, always, the man who de- 
serted her, and we have them deserted, all I” 

“None of them deserted us, by any chance?” 
asked Conn cheerfully. Blackbury was silent. 

Des Roseaux went on. 

“It is simple. We are none of us husbands. We 
have loved all of us, because every man not a youth 
has done so. I don’t speak of the little ladies of 
the pavement, but of the serious affection. Well, 
we love, we do not marry, we go to the end of the 


190 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


world. Tell me there is not one we have all of us 
leaved behind, who remember, who weep ! All four, 
I see her, I think it was not willing, that we lose that 
lady. It has been fate, perhaps.” 

“How do you know we’re none of us husbands?” 
spoke Conn jestingly. “I might have a wife in every 
port between Galway and Meliasi, for all you know.” 
But he was thinking, as he spoke, of Deirdre, all 
alone with the trader and his wife away on the deso- 
late mainland. Did she think he had deserted her? 
Hers was the figure that had flickered before his 
eyes as the Frenchman spoke. 

“You are not married,” pronounced Des Roseaux. 
“I am not married.” He went on, exactly as if he 
were repeating a verb. “He,” indicating Black- 
bury, “is not married. You,” addressing the silent 
Gatehouse, “are not married, too, that is so?” He 
spoke as if certain of the fact. 

Gatehouse looked up, and answered calmly, “I 
am.” 

“News to me,” remarked Blackbury. 

Des Roseaux was staring dramatically. “Mar- 
ried? She is dead?” he asked. 

“Certainly not,” replied the Secretary. “As 
much alive as I am.” 

“Why have you never told this?” 

“I can’t remember that anyone asked me.” 

“But your wife, where is she?” 

“Somewhere on earth.” 

“You know her alive?” 

“Yes. Is this a confessional?” 

“I demand pardon. I have been surprised. Will 
we have another game of cards? Bridge, I find 
it very good.” 

The subject was dropped at once, and cards went 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 19 1 

ahead for the rest of the evening. Conn played 
badly. He was intrigued and amazed by the Sec- 
retary’s confession. He had never thought of Gate- 
house — if he had thought of him at all — as a 
married man. He felt vaguely that a fellow his 
own age had no right to be, so long as he himself 
wanted to, and was not. It was, somehow, like 
Gatehouse’s cheek. No, he had never liked him. 
One thing he was compelled to allow; Gatehouse 
was no liar. His character was tortuous and strange 
— beyond Conn’s understanding at times — but it 
was, at least, sound. He need not have told the 
truth just now ; it seemed he did not want to. . . . 
Why? 

“So far as I’ve yet grasped the game,” came Black- 
bury’s deep bass, “it seems to be considered bad 
form to revoke, partner; especially when — No 
apology, but wake up a bit if you can.” 

“Sorry,” said Conn, wrenching back his attention 
to his hand. 


They parted fairly late. The wind was down; 
the dead hours lying between twelve and four o’clock 
had started on their course. Under the Residency 
island, the sea lay marble, silver-veined. Lights 
were out in the town; a thick, sweet, chilly scent 
came from the forest lying close behind — a midnight, 
mysterious scent. The bison-shouldered hills, where 
no man went, heaved black against the moon; you 
would have sworn that they were thundering in a 
herd, down on the crouching houses that had run to 
the end of the land. There was a curious silence, 
fretted only, at its fringes, by the faint “fish-fish” 


192 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


of the sinking tide. A silence that did not merely 
happen; a silence that was kept. 

Conn, Celt to the core, felt it. He wondered 
if the others — No. They did not love this sinister 
country as he loved it; its personality, for them, 
did not exist. 

The French Commissioner was yawning, politely, 
behind his hand, a vision of white sheets and 
vaporous mosquito netting, well tucked in, possessed 
him. Gatehouse, tall, curiously stately in his bear- 
ing, stood silent in the moonlight, arms folded so as 
to make his shoulders, in their white dinner-coat, 
look very broad. He seemed, so standing, much 
more like a representative of royalty than the 
sturdy, wide-bellied Blackbury. Britain’s Commis- 
sioner, also yawning a little, shook hands with his 
guests, and told Conn, brusquely, that he’d be obliged, 
when the latter next went to Carbery’s (there was 
little, it seemed, that the Commissioner did not 
know) if he brought Miss Rogers back with him 
to the Residency. It was, Blackbury remarked, the 
only suitable place in the Cumberlands for her to 
stay, and since wandering females would come there, 
it was up to him, more or less, to see they didn’t get 
into mischief. 

“I’ve no idea at all of giving my good Des 
Roseaux a chance for his country by having an 
agreeable young female roasted on a stick by the 
cannibals, within hail of Meliasi, as a sample of 
what British prestige amounts to,” he observed. 
“Of course,” he added, “you’ll bring Mrs. Carbery 
too. She’ll be an addition to the house; she can 
keep the boys from combing their hair with the 
dinner forks, once in a way.” 

Something in the casual speech induced Conn to 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 193 

wring Blackbury’s hand when saying good-bye. 
After the tongue-lashing in public, down in Meliasi 
street, which Conn had stood so unwillingly — this! 
He would swear that the Commissioner understood 
the whole thing from beginning to end, in spite of 
the attitude he had, officially, taken up. The liking, 
curiously filial, that a man in the twenties often feels 
for one in the fifties, took hold of him. He won- 
dered, as he went down the winding track to the 
sea, why Blackbury hadn’t ever married anyone. 
Conn’s thoughts ran on marriage. He had never 
seriously considered it before, and it looked good 
to him. After all, what a wonderful arrangement 
it was! You took a fancy to a girl, dodged about 
to see her and talk to her and kiss her, and all of 
a sudden society and civilization, which had always 
had you on a string, so far as she was concerned, 
turned right round the other way and said — “Now 
we’re going to arrange things so that you can have 
her all the time — we’re organized for that — didn’t 
look at it before that way, did you ? — but there it is ; 
we’ll tie her up to you so fast that neither of you 
can ever get away if you want to.” There was a 
curious pleasure in that, as if people had forced 
one’s head into a mass of roses, or driven a goblet 
of rare wine hard against one’s lips. “We’ll give 
her to you, this goddess, to darn your socks and see 
to the cooking of your food. We’ll build houses 
meant for you and her, we’ll consider you and her 
in the fixing of rents and the pricing of bread. Civili- 
zation is meant to give her to you and you to her; 
that’s what it’s for. That’s how your private little 
emotions ride to their fulfilment — on the back of the 
galloping world.” 

Curious, when you looked at it like that. 


194 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


Conn went down the path to the boat, pleased with 
civilization. 


Up in the Residency, Des Roseaux gone, the 
Commissioner and his Secretary were together. 
Gatehouse, much the taller man of the two, stood 
over Blackbury, majestic in his white suit and his 
folded arms, a little theatrical. 

“Sir, can you give me leave of absence for a 
little?” he asked. 

“Leave? Where to, man?” 

“Am I obliged to answer that, sir, or may I take 
a holiday where I choose?” 

“Of course you’re not obliged to answer. Go 
where you like — though for the matter of that, 
there’s nowhere to go to. How long do you want?” 

“Some weeks, if I may, sir?” 

“You’ll miss steamer day.” 

“Do you desire me to stay for it, sir?” 

“Dash it. Gatehouse, you talk as if you were 
Jane Eyre addressing Rochester. I don’t desire 
anything. If you want a holiday, take it by all 
means. When do you want to go?” 

“Tomorrow.” 

“Right. You might tell the boy to clear away and 
put out the lamps. Night I” 


CHAPTER XI 


TN the pearlers’ house on the top of Wawaka 

Island, the little man Fursey and the big man 
Child were holding converse. 

It was a curious place.^ Not at all what Deirdre, 
on that night of her visit to Conn’s island, had 
pictured the pearlers’ home. A sort of palace was 
what she had fancied it — white stone, perhaps; dis- 
play of handsome vulgar things about the rooms — 
red satin furniture, beds with gilt tops and dusty, 
coagulated silken draperies, such as she had seen 
in island hotels of the more pretentious kind. . . . 

As a fact, it was not built of stone, iron, or even 
wood. It was one immense leaf-thatch roof, dark 
with the smoke of years, angled above a space as 
big as a barn. That space was floored with white 
coral gravel, renewed as often as it grew dirty, which 
threw a faint reflected light from the six great doors, 
up into the mysteries of the beamed and raftered 
roof. The walls were bark, panelled between poles. 
Windows the place had none. Who wished to read 
or write — occupations not favoured by the folk of 
Wawaka Island — might go and seat himself near 
to one of the great doors that were never shut, save 
in hurricane weather. An ordinary north-wester 
storm interfered scarce at all with anyone’s comfort, 
the place was so large. Rain might dash in for yards 
at any opening, without coming near the ring of 
195 


196 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

men smoking, drinking, or playing cards somewhere 
towards the centre of the hall. 

Once under the roof of Wawaka House, you saw 
the whole of it. There were no bedrooms; mos- 
quito nets lay piled at intervals, and near them were 
rough but easy mattresses made by the natives out 
of trade cottons and the silky fibre of the kapok nut. 
There was no kitchen; every man kicked his boy 
to cook his meals when he felt like it, at any one 
of the cooking fires freely lit on the gravel floor. 
There was no dining room, since each man fed, like 
a wild dog of the forests, only as hunger urged him. 
Hammock chairs of canvas and bush timber stood 
about the floor, and somewhere near the middle of 
the huge place, four tree trunks had been driven into 
the ground, a few planks nailed to their tops, and 
a few more stumps set in the earth about them. 
This was the dinner table, seldom used. The 
pearlers preferred native fashion, and sat on the 
ground, plate on knees. 

It was duskish now, going on to six o’clock, and 
the boats were in. Most of the day, about the im- 
mense reaches of Meliasi harbour, the sloops had 
been sailing, anchoring and sailing again; the native 
crews had been diving, hard driven by kicks and 
curses. They were naked ; they streamed with water, 
and shivered, in spite of the heat. They squatted 
on the gunwales -and drew in long breaths before 
they went down, panting a good deal, and groaning 
to themselves. They did not want to dive for the 
pearlers of Meliasi — was it not known that no native 
lived more than a year or two at that cruel game ? 
— But they had no choice, for they had been black- 
birded by the recruiting schooners and sold, at ten 
pounds a head, by the captains, on a nominal three 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 197 

years’ “engagement.” Blackbury’s ceaseless industry 
in following up and threatening the vessels of this 
hateful trade, had done some good; it was always 
possible that a visiting man-of-war would high- 
handedly confiscate a schooner or two on his report. 
But enough remained to keep the pearling grounds 
supplied. 

The “boys” had carried up to Wawaka storehouse 
the great tubs of pearl-shell, roughly cleaned. 

The shelling, here, was in no way like shelling as 
practised in the Paumotus, Thursday Island, or 
Broome. There, the shell itself was the chief object 
of the game, pearls, however valuable, being merely 
an incident. Here in the New Cumberlands, the 
“lapi-lapi” was of so little value as not to be worth 
shipping away; pearls were the only things one 
counted on. They were good pearls on the whole, 
but not very plentiful. No one on Wawaka had 
made a fortune. The men of the pearling crowd 
worked separately; there were a score or so in all, 
and each owned his boat and his crew. But they 
had agreements about the partitioning of the dif- 
ferent pearling banks, about the sharing out of boys 
when needed, and especially — for here lay the heart 
and kernel of the colony — about keeping outsiders 
away. 

Meliasi pearling grounds suited them ; the labour 
was cheap and plentiful, the shell easy to get. Best 
of all, there was no law. In other places, men could 
be “had up” for knocking a boy on the head in a 
drunken fit; for stealing a boy from a village, and 
keeping him captive; for under-feeding and over- 
working. Not so on Wawaka. It was an ideal life, 
to the typical beachcombers who made up Wawaka’s 
colony, and they had agreed — coming together from 


198 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

various parts of the Pacific — to keep it to them- 
selves. Towards that end, they built their common 
house, and arranged their laws, Fursey dictating 
most of them. To the same end, they burned or sunk 
at anchor the vessels of rivals from any other part 
of the South Seas; sometimes did worse, as unex- 
plained “accidents” in the bush could testify. It 
came to be understood, in a year or two, that Meliasi 
shelling grounds were best let alone. And Wawaka 
reigned over them in triumph. And ove'r Wawaka 
reigned Fursey, unchallenged, undisputed, cock of 
the walk — till the afternoon in Meliasi high street 
when Conn the Hundred Fighter broke his spurs 
and cut his comb. 

That was near a week past, and Fursey still lay 
most of the day on his kapok mattress, with a native 
woman to fan away the flies and britig him drink, 
whenever he swore at her by way of asking for it. 
Fursey drank the “King’s Peg” — liqueur brandy and 
champagne — and it was not goad for his wounds, 
which were neither light nor few, for Conn’s 
stingaree tail, swung by a practised hand, had left 
terrible cuts, arul the tropic climate, which makes 
even a scratch perilous unless instantly dressed, had 
burned them into inflammation before any one 
thought of taking precautions. So Fursey was 
bandaged up in many places, and could not move 
without pulling on a dried and stuck dressing — con- 
sequently, could not move without cursing the uni- 
verse, its author, and most especially Conn. 

His mattress was placed somewhat towards the 
side of the huge building, in the centre of which a 
dozen men were lying on mats, smoking, talking, and 
shouting out directions to the boys who, hungry and 
tired, bent over cooking fires farther away. Some- 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


199 


one was beating eggs with a loud clatter, in a tin 
bowl; fish, frying on two or three fires, smelt sav- 
oury. A native had just taken off the cover of a 
j camp oven, and the bread sent forth pleasant invita- 
I tion to hungry men. The owner of the oven, and 
' the friend from whom he had borrowed the flour, 
were in hot dispute about the ownership of the bread, 
and blows seemed not far away. Nobody took the 
slightest notice. Wawaka was well used to shouts 
and curses — to worse things than either. 

“Are you going to have any kai-kai?” asked 
Child, in his toneless voice. He seemed, after some 
' vague fashion, to have constituted himself nurse to 
Fursey. 

“No,” answered Fursey. Commonly he would 
have tacked comet tail of his peculiar oaths on to 
such a refusal. Tonight, nothing but the pain fol- 
lowing on movement of his limbs extracted curses 
from him; his ordinary talk was purged of all pro- 
fane sayings. Child, who knew Fursey better than 
most, watched him as a man watches a lowering 
glass in hurricane time. When Fursey’s safety valve 
was closed. . . . 

“Call them all here,” said Fursey suddenly. “I 
want to speak to them. You can go.” He pushed 
the fat, cowed-looking native girl, dressed in beads 
and a fringe of grass, away with his foot. She slunk 
off, looking oddly back at him. It may have been 
that Kalaka knew, or guessed, more than anyone 
supposed. Women are quick. . . . 

Fursey was the chief, still, of his clan, although 
Conn the Hundred Fighter had dimmed the glory 
of his prestige. Perhaps the pearlers respected less 
the man they had seen beaten and howling like a 
dog, in the main street of MeliasL But they still 


200 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

feared him. Fursey’s salient characteristic — that 
you never knew what he would do ; especially, never 
could rely on his not doing anything on earth or sea 
— remained unchanged. 

They came up, shambling, with the “Pacific 
slouch” through the growing dimness of the huge 
white-floored hall. Som'ebody ought to have lit the 
hurricane lamps, but nobody had, as yet. The cook- 
ing fires flared up and sank, as the wind from the sea 
swept through the open doors, died down and rose 
again. The place was like a cave. 

“Send the boys away,” said Fursey, very quietly. 
M'ac, with the red hair, looked at Smith, who was 
only a Smith, and kicked him slyly. The kick said, 
“Something up.” 

The boys, broken off in the midst of their cook- 
ery, hustled themselves away out of the place, chat- 
tering like monkeys. A few of them, in the dusk and 
cdnfusion, snatched at bits of food, and carried them 
away. The others fought them for it, loudly, out- 
side. 

Fursey waited till the snarling and squabbling 
had gone off towards the huts occupied by the native 
labour, and then, heaving him'self up painfully on 
one elbow, spcke. 

And Child, once a Harrow boy, listening to him, 
understood, as he had understood before, how it 
was that the small ruffian kept his hold upon these 
men; wondered dully, as he had wondered often, 
where and how Fursey might have taken the wrong 
turn that led him down the hill. For the man could 
speak; could throw his personality into his words, 
and send the words like bullets. 

“They’d have liked him on Speech Day. I mean, 
if he hadn’t been a bounder and an outsider. But 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 201 


he Is,” thought Child to himself. He looked at his 
naik, and felt pleased, as far as he had power left 
to be pleased by anything, with their keeping and 
their shape. 

Fursey was speaking. 

. to know once and for all if you’re men 
or mice. How long is it to go on? How long is 
this white-faced lout who caught me unawares and 
struck me like a dog, to make game of everyone 
in the Islands ? He’s to have the fine house and the 
wines and cigars and the flash furniture, isn’t he, and 
to give himself the airs of a Commissioner at least, 
and you and I are to live hard and work hard and 
wa'tch him doing the swell? That’s it, isn’t it? 
That’s what you like. You’ve no pride of your own 
— no.t you. You don’t want the good things of the 
enough for you. Gold, or something as good as 
gold, right under your feet, but you don’t trouble 
about that. You’re rats. What do rats want with 
gold? Give ’em a bit to nibble, and a hole to run 
into. 

“And Conn — Conn !” He snarled over the word ; 
he mouthed it as a cat snarls over and mouths a 
bone. “Conn beats you — ^yes, I know what you’re 
thinking as well as if you had said it; you’re thinking 
that he beat me. No ! that fight’s only begun; make 
no mistake about it. But it never was — on with you. 
You were beaten before you began. ^ Co*nn the Hun- 
dred Fighter, some fool called him. Well, he’s 
fought all of you, and a f«ew more, and beat you — 
beat you ! So perhaps the name fits after all. You 
get up a hunt once in a way, and chase him into^ the 
bush, and he doubles, and laughs at you. And If it 
weren’t for me, you’d go on with your silly 
Conn hunts to the end of times. Well! I’ve done 


202 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


with them. Done, No more Conn hunts for me.” 

He paused for a moment. He was an ugly little 
figure, there in the leaping firelight, leaning on his 
elbow and looking up at the men. His red mous- 
tache stood out as a cat’s whiskers stand out; his 
face, bleached by confinement to the house, seemed 
boiling at white-heat, so did it simmer and send up 
bubbles of evil feeling. Fursey knew the effect of 
the oratorical pause. He gave it full weight before 
beginning again. 

“Now I have to ask you again, are you men or 
mice, and will you back me out in what I’m going to 
do? I swear, if you don’t it’ll be done all the same, 
and the only difference will be, you’ll get nothing out 
of it.” 

“Why’re you tellin’ us, then?” demanded hoarsely, 
the man called Mac, who had, it may be, a vein of 
Scotch caution somewhere. 

“Because,” said Fursey, shutting his ey#es, like one 
weary of men’s folly, “it’s tiresome having to shoot 
people, when they get in your way.” He opened his 
eyes again suddenly, and they glared catlike. “But 
don’t you bank on my tiredness.” 

“What are ye goin’ to get us? Conn’s stuff?” 

Fursey nodded, once, twice, three times. The 
men drew quick breaths; a little fire of questions 
broke out. Fursey answered none of them. He 
only held up his red hairy little hand for silence, and 
when it was attained, said just two words — 

“Sh'e knows.” 

“What, the girl?” asked Child, who had taken 
no part hitherto. 

“The girl.” 

“Rats. Who’d tell a girl a thing worth thou- 
sands?” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 203 

It was a small, hairy man who spoke; a Cockney- 
looking little fellow, somewhat unclean. 

^ “Abstract speculation,” said Fursey with a learned 
air, “has led many away. The question before the 
meeting is not who would tell a girl, but has anyone 
told a girl ? And to that, gentlemen, I answer with- 
out hesitation, ‘Yes.’ You would ask me” — he was 
very grand now — “how I know. On the evening 
when we lost Conn, being at the time hot on the 
scent. Conn turned up, miles away, with the girl, 
both of them dirty and tired looking, and left her 
with the Garberys at the Long Beach. We are not 
possessed of information” — he was getting grander 
with every word — “as to where the afternoon was 
spent. But our informant, one Maraki, who was 
coming back from a head-hunting holiday in the 
bush, informs us that the said Conn, when parting 
with the lady, put his h'and over her mouth, as a 
signal of silence, it being understood, even by the 
boy, to be such.” 

The men, standing in slouched attitudes about the 
coral shale, shifted their feet with a rattling sound, 
and one burst out “My oath!” 

“Very well,” went on Fursey, who was beginning 
to show the effects of the last “King’s Peg,” “the 
question is, are we going to stop here pigging along 
all our lives, with a drunk now and then in 
Noumea or Sydney, or are we going to make 
that pasty-faced little Mary tell us? What’s a 
woman anyhow, to stand between twenty men and 
what they want? What right has she to be dip- 
ping her paws in the pie that we’ve been hunting 
for years?” 

“Hunting a pie,” murmured Child dully. “Gad, 
what a metaphor 1 See it runnin’ its little heart out 


204 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


through the bush, with a knife and fork stuck in it. 
Whoop, tally-ho!” 

No one took any notice of Child. It was not the 
custom, .on Wawaka, to listen to what other people 
said, except on rare ocasions like Fursey’s speech. 
You talked yourself, and tried to shout down the 
rest. . . . 

Among the pearlers, speech was bursting up like 
waters held back underneath lock gates, and only 
now released. “Wants it all for herself, does she, 
little dear?” “What price us?” “I’m for making 
her talk.” “How will he— ’’ “But if they should— ” 
“Hurray, boys, we’ll gut his mine for him!” And 
over all, like lightning playing above clouds, the 
flicker of careless oaths that accompanied every 
speech on the pearlers’ island. 

Fursey, watching them as a coach-driver watches 
his team tearing round a difficult corner, saw that 
the instant had arrived. Child had an odd fancy 
that he saw a bunch of reins in the hand of the 
little ruffian, as the latter, leaning from his couch, 
and scanning the faces of the standing men, gestured 
fiercely forward, and cried out — 

“Then, bullies. I’ll tell you how we’re going to 
do it, and if I fail — if I don’t set you every one 
rolling in money within the next three weeks — ^you 
can drop me over the edge of Wawaka into deep 
water, for it’ll be all that I’ll be good for hence- 
forth !” 

A roar answered him. 

“Here,” said Fursey, tossing them a bottle of his 
own liqueur brandy, followed by another and an- 
other. “Warm your hearts up with that stuff, and 
let’s talk.” 


i CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 205 

Dusk deepened into night; the cooking fires, ne- 
f glected, sank down, under the dark arch of the cave- 
[ like roof, from orange to amber, from amber to a 
: pale geranium glow. Nobody lit the lamps; no boys 
; returned to work. The pearling men, bunched by 
I Fursey’s bed, heads close together, as if anyone — 
I anyone at all — on the summit of their remote, 
I guarded island, could have overheard them, talked; 
I commented, put questions, and answered them. 

* Despite Fursey’s brandy — which was, after all, not 

* much to men accustomed to over-proof rum — their 
j heads seemed clear; they were quieter than ordinary. 
1! This was no common game they had set-out to play; 
" nor were the stakes a trifle. 

And Child, his huge limbs in their coarse khaki 
1' clothing doubled up as he sat on the sand, watched 

* and listened and s*aid nothing. Until the end of the 
] discussion*, when the men were separating, shouting 
: for their boys, an,d going back to their neglected 
j meal. Then Fursey turned to him, and said threat- 
^ eningly — 

“No funny business from you, mind.” 

Child, with his huge arms twisted round his knees, 
i' of which the joints stood out like cocoanuts, shook 
his head. 

“Why should she not go to hell like all the rest of 
: us?” he asked. 

i “What do you mean? I’d have thought you had 
I a fairly comfortable billet here, keeping accounts 
1! and so on, and eating your skin tight on next to no 
1 work.” 

' “All the same,” said Child, heaving himself up 

ii and making for the corner of the house where his 
I own mattress was spread, “I’ve been in hell this long 
I time, and I know it.” 


2o6 conn of the coral SEAS 


“Mad,” said Fursey, to the man Smith, who hap- 
pened to be near. 

“I should think so,” answered Smith. “Any more 
of that fine old brandy, chief?” 

Fursey, who loved all titles, handed another 
bottle to him royally, without a word. Smith had 
one accomplishment — one only — that of grinning 
and winking with one side of his face, while remain- 
ing unmoved as to the other. He did It now. 


To the Residence Island, In great state, came that 
same afternoon Mrs. Carbery, accompanying Delr- 
dre. It was the event of the good woman’s life, and 
it caused heartburnings Indescribable among the 
seven other ladies of MellasI town. Blackbury had 
not thought well to ask one as chaperon, although 
almost any of them would have been better qualified, 
so far as social experience went, than Mrs. Carbery. 
But there were difficulties. The wife of the hotel 
keeper — British — drank. The wife of the hotel 
keeper — French — ^was sober, ladylike, even accom- 
plished, but she was only “wife” by courtesy. The 
wife of the big store-keeper had eight small children. 
The wife of the small store-keeper had consumption. 
The wives of one French trader and one English had 
native blood. The widow of the late captain of a 
late steamer that had been sunk in Mellasi harbour 
was partly out of her mind. So there remained only 
Mrs. Carbery. 

They set out from the trading station, not in a 
canoe this time, but in all the splendours of Black- 
bury’s official whaleboat, with its ten dark oarsmen, 
clad in blue kilts vandyked with red braid, Fiji pat- 
tern, and wreaths of scarlet flowers. The coxswain. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 207 

a man of importance, had two wreaths, also thirty- 
four rings of tortoise-shell in his ears, and a very 
handsome boar’s tusk thrust through the septum 
of his nose. Mrs. Carbery was dressed in a shot 
silk of dark green and red, rather like an umbrella, 
made in the fashion of the year of her marriage. 
(Her eldest son, if he had lived, would have been 
fifteen that summer.) She had a bonnet of feathers 
and jet, and very large white sand-shoes from the 
store, quite clean and new. Deirdre, in her inevitable 
transparant black, with a red flower placed cunningly 
under the brim of the wide black hat that shaded 
her from the afternoon sun, thought they must make 
a curiously contrasted pair. She was very Spanish 
looking that -day. Those who knew Deirdre best 
had said that she always seemed to hark back to her 
memories -of Cordova and Madrid, when she was 
inclined to flirt. 

She was so inclined today. Conn had come over, 
not as she, and he, had anticipated, quietly for a 
talk, but in the Commissioner’s boat, acting as Black- 
bury’s representative. There had been scarcely any 
chance of speaking in private, and from what there 
was Deirdre had shrunk away. Her mood had 
changed. So long as Conn said nothing, nothing 
need happen; no decisions need be made. The 
world was pleasant as it was; why not stay the 
march of events? 

She had discarded, on boarding the island steamer, 
the plain gold ring she generally wore— which 
Rogers, by the way, had not remembered to give her; 
it was a hurried, shamefaced purchase of her own, 
made in a Continental town. The misunderstanding 
about her name which had resulted in placing her 
on the passenger list as “Miss” Rogers suited her 


208 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


well enough. She was tired of travelling about as a 
widow. Since it seemed that she couldn’t, mustn’t, 
wasn’t to tell the truth, it was as well to select the 
form of misunderstanding that promised the pleas- 
antest results. 

Conn, seated in the stern as near Deirdre as he 
could conveniently get, was not quite sorry to have 
his proposal put off. The girl couldn’t get away, 
and there was oceans of time — always, in the New 
Cumberlands. One had time enough for every- 
thing, and a bit more to that. No man really likes 
offering marriage ; there is, perhaps, in every male, 
some drop remaining of the cave-man blood which 
wordlessly protests against the silly necessity of “ask- 
ing” a woman at all. And one may always hope to 
manage the affair without absurd set phrases, if one 
drifts long enough. So Conn, cheerfully determined 
on having this girl for his wife, and comfortably 
sure that she was interested in him, lay back in the 
whaleboat -and looked, with confidence, into a golden 
easy future that was not there. 

They swept alongside the Residency pier, and 
brought up by the boat steps ; Conn handed out the 
women, and followed them up to the house. The 
boat boys took his orders as they would have taken 
Blackbury’s own. Not for nothing was he called the 
“little” king of the . islands — a phrase that had no 
reference, naturally, to his height, which was a com- 
fortable five feet ten. 

Mrs. Carbery, her head upheld as ladies in crino- 
line photographs uphold it, umbrella nursed in one 
arm, chin drawn in, eyes looking down, came after 
Deirdre, the picture of faded and out-of-date ele- 
gance. She had done her hair better than usual 
today, but a lock or two braved the wild south-easter 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 209 

for all that, and her veil was slatting like a flag. So 
absorbed was she with her “conduct” and -her hair 
and her umbrella and her veil, that she did not notice, 
until he was right upon her, a man coming down 
from the Residency, preceded by two or three na- 
tives carrying luggage. The man, clearly, had not 
noticed them coming up. Just here the path took 
several turns, and one might well be unaware of the 
presence of anybody else upon it. 

“Hallo, Gatehouse,” greeted Conn.; ..“Off for 
your inland trip?” 

The Secretary made some indefinite reply, and 
dashed past with hardly the bow that politeness de- 
manded. “Must be in a hurry,” commented Conn. 
Deirdre said nothing. 

But when they got up to the Residency, and had 
been shown their rooms — two bare, pleasant white 
painted bedrooms overlooking the tops of the palms 
and an immense reach of sea — Deirdre, powdering 
at her glass, remarked through the open door to 
Mrs. Carbery, “I can’t help thinking I have seen 
that man before.” 

“Is it the man we seen on the road up, him who 
leapt past us the way the divil went through Ath- 
lone?” 

“Yes.” 

“That one would be to be the Secretary, me gurl. 
I never seen (him, but I have heard spache of him, 
many’s the time, and he does be very great for 
thramping the bush hither and to, among the 
neegurs. Me man, he say that Gatehouse is all the 
wan as the kings they do be having in it, an’ he says 
that if Conn is the ‘little king,’ the Gatehouse does 
be the big wan. But that’s all their chat, so it is. 


210 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“Gatehouse? I don’t remember the name. One 
meets so many people travelling. I suppose I’ve run 
across him somewhere.” 

Deirdre was unpinning her hair as she spoke, let- 
ting loose its dusk curtain over the dressing sacque 
she had taken from her suitcase. Mrs. Carbery 
looked at her with an appraising eye. 

“Ye’d a right to be wed, an’ you twenty-eight; 
sure, it’s almost an old woman you are,” she re- 
marked, with a hairpin in her mouth. Her own hair, 
now under process of reconstruction, was as the thin 
hill stream to the full river of valley lands, com- 
pared with Deirdre’s. But there was neither jeal- 
ousy nor discourtesy in her remark. Deirdre, know- 
ing her own countrywomen, knew the peasant point 
of view. Mrs. Carbery had been married at twenty- 
five, amid the loud thanksgivings of a family that had 
thought her fate past praying for. She was hon- 
estly anxious for Deirdre. She had taken a curious, 
suppressed sort of fancy to her; an echo of her own 
wrecked maternity — for there had been, and were 
not, sons and daughters of the Carberys. 

. Deirdre said nothing at all. She hated lying, 
much as a cat hates wet. Like the cat, she had been 
driven into the wet now and again, and hated it all 
the more for that. And any mention of marriage, 
in her presence, was like to bring the soil upon her 
dainty fur again. What could one do? 

She was learning — she had learned — ^^through all 
those interminable seven years, what it cost one to 
walk against the stream of any common custom or 
belief. Young, fascinating women couldn’t but be 
married, or . . . the other thing. Probably they 
were married, or . . . the«other thing ... if 
they didn’t seem to be. Thus public opinion, in 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


21 1 


Tenenffe, in Colon, In Tahiti, In New Zealand. And 
all that Deirdre had to set against It was the tire- 
some, scandalous, never-believed true story, or the 
convenient not-quite-believed little He. And neither 
saved her, quite. One always walked, bumping, 
against the crowd. If one stepped off the customary 
side of the road. 

There was Mrs. Carbery, now — she would have 
to lie to her in another moment. It was like a bad 
dream, this thing; the sort of dream that one dreams, 
and waked from for a minute, and then, falling 
asleep, dreams again and again. She did not like to 
He to Mrs. Carbery. She — 

The Irishwoman’s hair was up, as much as It ever 
was. She had tidied the fearful lace collar she wore, 
and was arranging the large bow of red and yellow 
silk that fastened it. As she pulled out the last loop, 
she turned to Deirdre, and said — 

“Is that right, jewel? Yes? It’s a clane pattern. 
It is. Tell me, daughter of Alryan, where’s your hus- 
band?” 

Deirdre was so taken aback that she could not 
answer. She felt her mouth dropping open; the 
hairbrush falling down in her slack hand, by her 
side. 

“Ye have no call to be woild, daughter,” pro- 
ceeded Mrs. Carbery calmly, “nor ye have no call 
to answer. If ye rather be keeping it to yourself.” 

“How did you — when did you — I mean, I don’t 
understand what you mean,” parried Deirdre des- 
perately. What she now saw with perfect clearness 
was that she had not meant to tell Conn. 

“It kem over me,” was Mrs. Carbe^’s compre- 
hensive answer. “It be to be coming this long time, 
I’m thinking, but just now, when I told ye ye had a 


212 CONN OF TFIE CORAL SEAS 


right to be wed, it kem like a strong wakeness on 
me, and I knew It. Sure, that was why the marriage 
card would nivir come up for ye, daughter. Why 
would it, and you wed?” 

“I’m not,” broke out Deirdre determinedly. It 
was true, essentially — was It not? She had told her- 
self so, many times. 

The woman of forty, wife and mother, took the 
girl lightly by the shoulders, and turned her face to 
the light. Deirdre winced as two blue-grey eyes, full 
of women’s knowledge, searched her. 

“It’s true,” murmured Mrs. Carbery. “It’s true 
— but, d-aughter. If It’s true, what way is It the cards 
will not give you the marmage sign, n‘or the death 
sign, for married or dead such as you be to be, 
daughter, as long as there’s men in the world that’s 
men?” 

Deirdre, under that raking glance, raised one 
hand, and half awkwardly laid It across her cheek; 
she did not dare, quite, to cover her eyes. But Mrs. 
Carbery pounced upon the hand. It was the left. 
She held it In hers, and scanned the slim third 
finger. 

Now Deirdre had not been we’aring her bought 
wedding ring since she had left Sydney, abandoning, 
half by accident, her marriage tie. But a narrow ring 
worn for years leaves traces that do not wear out in 
a few weeks. Mrs. Carbery dropped the hand, full 
assurance in her eyes. With the delicacy of her race 
she asked no further questions, but, adjusting once 
again her terrible collar, remarked that “by the way 
the neegurs was smashing cups In the kitchen, it 
would be to be time for tea.” 

They went out again on to the verandah, where 
Blackbury was waiting. Tea was brought; Conn, 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


213 


who seemed to be making a day of it, appeared from 
somewhere or other, and drank five cups of tea, one 
after the other, making it perfectly clear, in a word- 
less way of his own, that he did this thing because 
Deirdre was pouring out. Deirdre, on whom the 
strain of the day was having odd effects, began to 
feel^ almost hysterical as she filled his cup again and 
again. She wanted to laugh, and laugh and laugh — 
or was it cry? She could not be sure. 

Suddenly, in the midst of tea, she felt, with horror, 
that her eyes were filling with tears. She made an 
excuse, got back to her room and stood in the middle 
of it, cleanching her hands. The room had four long 
glass doors, all widely open because of the heat. It 
gave on the verandah on the inner dining room, on 
two different bedrooms. Every sound could be 
heard; every movement she made could be seen, un- 
less she deliberately pulled down the blinds and 
closed the doors. There is no privacy in tropical 
houses; you must not be upset, or sulky, in a tropical 
house ; you cannot have a sorrow or a box of choco- 
lates, a joy or a cigar to yourself. Over the open 
partitions of the rooms, unceiled, through the swung- 
back, curtained, many doors, will issue forth the 
scent of your smoke or your sweets, the rip of an 
envelope, the tearing-up sound that accompanies the 
writing of love letters. If you fling yourself on your 
bed, he, she, and they will hear the creak of the 
mattress. If you lie awake at night, and turn, and 
sigh, it will be as if you did it in a dorm«itory, where 
wakeful ears hear, and curious minds draw conclu- 
sions. If you want to be alone, and wish yourself 
dead, in peace, the mere closing of doors, in a tem- 
perature of 90 shade, attracts the attention and 
amazement of all the house, and invites offers of 


214 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


quinine bihydrochloride. It is not good to have a 
s-orrow, or a perplexity, in tin houses of Pacific 
lands. 

Deirdre, the sun being almost down, felt there 
was but one thing to do — get out of doors. She 
peered through her lace blind, sidewise. Mrs. Car- 
bery, seated very upright, with her hair as spiky as a 
hedgehog’s (“I wonder how she does it,” thought 
Deirdre) was looking out over the blazing green 
of the harbour; she seemed wrapped in a prophetic 
trance, but her former guest knew, by experience, 
that she was nevertheless “all there,” and could even 
see and hear things invisible and inaudible, taking 
place in the neighbourhood. Conn was staring at 
the lace blind — she wondered how much he could 
see. As for Blackbury, that good man, who never 
drank tea, he had had his two afternoon glasses of 
beer, and was more than half asleep. 

There was a mirror behind the door. Deirdre 
crept to it, and did the things to her hair that every 
self-respecting woman does when she has made up 
her mind. . . . She took her sunshade from the 
bed — it was a red one, and struck a high note of 
colour against her black dress. The little Spanish 
shoes slipped off easily; they were small enough to 
be carried by their heels in one slim hand. Thank 
Providence for all those doors ; now, down the back 
steps . . . shoes on. Under the coral tree; 

people could easily find one there, and the carpet of 
fallen flowers, thick and red, showed up the black. 
. . . She could see the picture as if she had had a 
glass ; red, black, and red, under the bare twigs of 
the tree; behind, a rampart of mangoes, dark green 
in the waning day.^ She had stopped thinking now; 
she was acting by instinct, driven like a leaf on the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 215 

wind of some fierce impulse that had awaked when 
Mrs. Carbery silently turned away with that strange 
knowledge in her eyes. If she thought at all, it 
was in broken fragments — “She shall not. . . .” 

“I will never. . . “Yes, he will! He will!” 

There followed a minute o-f still suspense. Un- 
able to bear any more, she lifted her Lead, and 
fluted, in the soft whistle that was scarcely less sweet 
than her voice, the last lines of “Gypsy Lover !” The 
tune was haunting, gay, and sad; the words as every- 
one knew, ran thus — 

“Far away, far away, were the hills are calling. 

To the open roadway to the roof of heaven’s blue. 

To the last long camp of all, when life’s last dusk is 
falling, 

Gypsy lover, gypsy lover I’ll go with you.” 

Then she waited. She was quite certain. . . . 

Light was failing now. A break in the trees gave 
her the sun’s last gleam, but there was shadow, 
water-clear and green, as evening shadows are on 
wooded islands, where the flight of steps came down 
behind the house. Conn’s fair, ruffled head and 
white coat seemed swimming, in that colourful dusk, 
as he came to her. When he reached the last drift of 
pale sun, it was as if he had landed, on a white 
shore, at her feet ! 

They looked at each other, and knew it was to be 
said. Deirdre, who had thrown down the card that 
every man who respects himself must meet with a 
higher one — if he is in the game — felt a strange 
calm descend upon her. For Conn, now, to play. 
Her mind folded its hands, and watched, almost in- 
curious. 


2i6 conn of the coral SEAS 


Conn 'had turned white, as a man does, in such 
moments. Before he spoke, Deirdre had time to 
note the extraordinary depth that his sudden pallor 
gave to his dark-lashed grey eyes; to see, with a 
needle-stab of feeling more than half prophetic, that 
he was young, shiningly young, because his years 
were the same as hers, who was not so very young 
now — to sense the primitive male’s uneasy hatred 
for the words of slavish petition that customs ex- 
acted from him, when all was understood already. 

. . . Then, frowning a little, looking a little like 

a lover, and more like a boy repeating a set lesson, 
he spoke. 

“I wanted to say something to you. I wanted to 
ask you to marry me.” 

There was just a perceptible pause before she 
replied — ^just time to hear the shock of two long 
waves that broke upon the sand, away below. . . . 

“You are doing me a great honour,” she said. 

“Is that yes?” 

“What you like,” said Deirdre, flinging her cap 
over the windmills once for all, and warming the 
cold words with a look that swept his lips to her, 
as one meteor, in dark night, sweeps to another, and 
meets it in a shock of force and flame. 

And again, in the silence, two waves burst upon 
the beach. Louder this time; the night was draw- 
ing up wild and dark. There would be lives lost 
on the reef before dawn, if that dull, warning voice 
spoke true. 

Neither Conn nor Deirdre heard it. They drew 
apart, and in the settling dusk, looked at each other 
with new eyes. 

“I wanted this,” said Conn, “since I came into 
my house that day and saw you and heard you at 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


217 


the^ piano. I said to myself, ‘That’s Deirdre, and 
Deirdre is the girl for me.’ And you see, she is. 
I get what I want !” 

“I don’t,” said Deirdre, “unless I pay horribly 
for it — like the man in the story — what was it? — 
who got the money because his son was dead.” Her 
eyes grew dark with indefinite fear. 

But Conn was cheerily commonplace. 

“Oh, you’ve got nothing to pay for me,” he as- 
sured her. “Such as they are, the goods don’t cost 
you anything. Send no money. We trust you.” 
He quoted from advertisements laughingly. He 
hardly knew what he said; he stared at her, seeing 
new beauties, because she was his — just as you and 
I see the cottage, the boat, the horse, with other eyes, 
as soon as the receipt is signed by the seller. . . . 
Was she not delicate, yet warm — warm as a flower 
in the sun — this thing of petal and perfume that 
he had won for his own? . . . 

To the girl, however, the sound of his words 
came chill. “We trust you. . . The jest had 
an edge. He did trust her. It had never occurred 
to him to do anything else. If he knew — 

She stared, intrigued, at his face. What would 
a man like Conn — a man who wore the steel hand, 
undoubtedly, beneath the velvet glove — do, if he 
knew himself deceived? Not, indeed, as men often 
are deceived by women, but tricked nevertheless. 
She thought she could fear him, under such circum- 
stances. She knew she could not reckon on his ac- 
tions. Was there not a spice of cruelty in his 
dealings with Fursey — though it had been done for 
her sake? Had she not heard that his natives 
feared him more than they loved? 

Determinedly, she drove her fears away. Who 


2i8 conn of the coral seas 


was to tell him? Mrs. Carbery could not be really 
dangerous; whatever she might suspect, she knew 
nothing. There were people in Sydney who had 
heard her called Mrs. Rogers; the constant com- 
merce with Sydney might make that risky, but after 
all, she could say she was a widow, as she had always 
said. Could she not? For all she knew it might 
be true. Certainly, she was in communication with 
the asylum doctor, as Shaw had arranged for her, 
and certainly she had heard nothing at all for two 
years — ^but that might mean that Rogers was dead. 
She strove, in a flash, to believe that it did — ^know- 
ing quite well, all the time, that it only meant the 
doctor didn’t approve of her, and wouldn’t write 
if he could help it. 

In any case, Deirdre, the ever-flying game and 
quarry of love — Deirdre, half-overtaken once, but 
never truly captured — Deirdre, for the first time 
submitting willingly and with whole heart to a 
lover’s kiss — could not feel herself a wife, a fet- 
tered woman, whatever her mind might have to 
say upon the matter. She drove the shadowy 
thought away determinedly. What was a form of 
words, to separate her from this man, this strong 
reality, her own? 

She had her hour. Till the stars stood white 
among the mango tops, the lovers walked, and 
talked, and told each other all that lovers have to 
tell. Conn led her, at last, to a high wind-blown 
point of the island, where, looking dizzily down, 
she could see, in the starlight, thin lines of foam 
wrinkling and creeping on a shadowy beach, over- 
swept by palms small as her hands; where, looking 
on the seas untracked by liners, no man ever 
came. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


219 


“World’s end, girlie,” he said, pointing out. 
“Lots of girls say they’d go to the end of the world 
with their boys, but you’ve done it. You jumped 
over the edge when you came to me. You see. 
Dear — ” he had already found her “little name,” 
the name of long ago and home — “there’s no going 
back for me. The Western Islands have me. Does 
it make you feel cold, all that?” For her hand, 
close in his, trembled. 

“You understand,” she said, “it does. It’s — 
it’s hard to break in — this air that isn’t prepared 
for us. It isn’t us — this country. It hates us; it’s 
lying in wait.” 

“Yes,” he said, looking out, and drawing a long 
breath. “But you haven’t said it. One doesn’t; 
one can’t. That’s part of it; there are no words 
for the things it is and does. If one might invent 
a kind of Esperanto — words for the things we know 
and can’t say.” 

She laughed the laugh of one who knows. “What 
would be the use ?” she said. “We understand, here, 
so we don’t need the words. And what, do you 
think, would they mean to people in dear 
daylight England? We’re in a kind of fourth 
dimension in the New Cumberlands. They don’t 
understand fourth dimension islands, north of the 
Line.” 

“It’s getting its claws into us,” said Conn, look- 
ing out and down. “Time to go in.” 

“Do you feel it?” she asked, leaning close. “Yes, 
let’s get into the little, little places and forget for 
a minute.” 

“For a minute,” he said, “it wins — some day.” 

“Is it death you mean?” 

“Yes — and other things. Let’s come down. I 


220 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


want you” — they were walking back now, like 
children, hand in hand, towards the lights, palm- 
chequered, of the Residency verandah — “I want you 
to promise me something.” 

“What?” 

“I want you to promise that you’ll stop on this 
island, and not stir off it on any pretense, till I 
see you again, unless you go with the Commissioner 
himself.” 

“But why — ^why?” 

“It doesn’t matter why; you’ll be promising to 
obey me some of these days — pretty soon, too. 
You might as well begin practising a little — Dear!” 

Deirdre put up her hand to her flushed cheek, 
thankful for the shielding dusk. Her independence, 
the spirit that had carried her, alone and brave, 
through all the world, seemed to be failing her ; and, 
strangely, she was almost glad it did. 

“Yes, I’ll promise,” she answered him, in a voice 
she scarcely knew for her own. “What a Griselda 
I shall be!” w^as her thought. 

“That’ll make my mind easy. It’s not a place 
for you to be roaming about by yourself.” 

“1 went and saw some of the villages with the 
Carberys.” 

“You had better not. You can go — with me.” 

“Are you an army in yourself?” she asked play- 
fully. 

“I’ve a pretty tight hold on these natives. And 
other people!” 

“So has Mr. Blackbury’s Secretary — ^what is his 
name? Gatehouse, I believe.” 

“Gatehouse,” pronounced Conn, “doesn’t really 
understand the New Cumberlands. For a new- 
comer, he’s horribly venturesome. Or rather, be- 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


221 


cause he’s a newcomer. He’s a man of big abilities 
and might do big things with these people, but 
somehow I fancy he won’t. Now don’t let’s talk 
of him any more, let’s talk of us. I’ll have to start 
off home in another minute. And don’t forget youi" 
promise.” 

“I think it’s rather unreasonable, you know,” 
qualified the future Griselda. 

“Never mind what you think — Dear. You stick 
to it. Here’s the verandah — jammit. I’m not 
swearing. That path is exactly two inches long. 
No, I won’t come in, it’s time for your dinner, pretty 
nearly. One! One more I a tiger!” 

He let her go; he was gone. And Deirdre, 
flushed, heart running like the tick of a watch, 
paused for a full minute, in the dark of the mango 
trees, to recover her composure, and smooth her 
hair. 

Mrs. Carbery asked no question. Blackbury, 
playing patience, after dinner, while his guests 
knitted and read, looked at the younger of the two 
several times from under his heavy brows, but spoke 
only of the commonplaces of Meliasi life. The 
evening passed dully. When bedtime came Mrs. 
Carbery fixed the girl with a ghost-seeing gaze, and 
faintly ejaculated, “Daughter of Airyan!” as they 
parted under the verandah lamp. There was a tone 
of something like dismay in the familiar exclama- 
tion — which Deirdre, by now, understood to refer 
to her nationality, but which carried different mean- 
ings at different moments of stress. She did not try 
to elucidate its meaning of the present. She hurried 
to her room. 

The last thought in her mind, as she fell asleep, 
was “what would he do if he knew?” 


CHAPTER XII 


I N the days that followed, Deirdre discovered 
somewhat to her amazement, that “John Bull” 
was a very pleasant host. 

The Commissioner, like the national type he re- 
sembled, was slow to undertake anything, but 
thorough and efficient In carrying It out once it was 
undertaken. His official duties being of the lightest, 
he found time to make excursions, to organize small 
parties of Mellasi’s few respectable residents, to 
have the Residency Island swimming bath put into 
order, and the Residency tennis lawn fenced In 
afresh, so that balls, when missed, did not In- 
variably plunge whirling Into the Pacific Ocean, a 
couple of hundred feet below. Deirdre enjoyed all 
these things, and Mrs. Carbery, whether she en- 
joyed them or not, went through them determinedly, 
and held her own with surpassing coolness, never put 
out by any of her numerous false steps on the slip- 
pery ground of social etiquette. 

They went. In Blackbury’s official whaleboat, to 
the dancing ground again, guarded by his armed 
boat’s crew; they walked through the avenue, ex- 
amined the weird figures, and shuddered at the 
gruesome braining stones. Deirdre thought of noth- 
ing so much as the secret hidden beyond the shell- 
heaps outside; she could hardly believe she had 
really seen the place sought for with so much fury, 
year after year, by the whole white population of 
222 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


223 


the New Cumberlands, and that no one even sus- 
pected her knowledge. ... In which last con- 
clusion she was, as we know, wrong. 

Mrs. Carbery, parasol above her head, skirt half 
trailing, half held up, deportment dignified in the 
last degree, and hair partly down, paraded the 
avenue as if it had been the approach to the Vice- 
regal Lodge. She was gratified by seeing it under 
such distinguished conditions; gratified also that she 
should see it at all. 

“Carbery, he said time and again, that if I was 
to lay toe upon the place, and I not having ten men 
with me, and they having guns, it would be roasting 
my liver they would be before the night was in it,” 
she declared, peering, with much satisfaction up at 
the face of a red-tongued demon who held both 
hands tight on his stomach, in an attitude suggestive 
of green apples for lunch. 

“My good lady,’’ remonstrated the Commis- 
sioner, with some asperity, “you seem to think that 
there’s no law and order at all in the country. We 
do try to keep up a little. Miss Rogers can tell 
you that she came down this very walk quite safely, 
alone, in the middle of the night.” 

“Whethen, Your Exshellenshy, she did not,” 
countered Mrs. Carbery briskly, “for there was a 
white man in it with her, wan that they do be call- 
ing the little king of the counthry, after Your Ex- 
shellenshy, who’s the big one.” 

“Is that the case?” asked Blackbury curtly. 
Deirdre knew him well enough to be aware that he 
felt a point of honour involved. She was about to 
answer, without much thought, “Oh, Mi*. Conn 
didn’t find me till I’d been here quite a while” — 
but checked herself. 


224 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


Was it well to say anything at all about the in- 
cidents of that afternoon? 

“Well?” asked the Commissioner. 

“Mr. Conn did take me to Mrs. Carbery’s,” 
answered Deirdre slowly. She was about to add 
something — she did not quite know what — when 
her eye was caught by a slight movement, or so it 
seemed to her, of one of the figures in the long row 
of carved and painted horrors; a large figure, set 
in an unusually large shrine. Instantly she became 
certain that there was something — someone — con- 
cealed there. Also, that no one but herself could, 
in all probability, be made to believe it. 

She walked, casually, but with jumping heart, to 
the figure. It was like all the rest — a half-filled-in 
sentry-box with a hideous wooden god occupying the 
upper half, and a great bird crouching on the top. 
There might or might not have been room for a 
man hidden underneath and behind the god. Im- 
possible to know — unless one had the whole thing 
knocked down and smashed, and here, in the New 
Cumberlands, that would mean something very 
like suicide. Impossible to make anyone under- 
stand what she thought she had seen — she could 
hardly have told herself. . Had she been so 
sure? She almost wavered. . . . Anyhow, 

a native might — 

Then, slowly, certainly, there came to her nostrils 
a single whiff of an odour that was the odour of no 
native — a suggestion of garlic and cigarette. . . . 
It was gone almost before she had perceived it. 
Mrs. Carbery, eager to look at the next figure, 
which was a smiling one, pulled her on. Had she 
fancied it? She knew she had not. But she was 
certain no one would agree with her. Silence was 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 225 

best, after all, if some white person had hidden 
himself — to spy. 

With a shock it came to her that Conn had been 
right,^ entirely right, when he extorted from her that 
promise not to leave the island unaccompanied. She 
could not suppose the unseen watcher was dogging 
Mrs. Carbery — or the Commissioner. The latter, 
indeed, might have been found alone, without even 
a native escort, often enough, had anyone desired; 
Blackbury did not trouble about taking an armed 
boat’s crew with him when he had no ladies in 
charge. 

Then, it followed that if someone were spying, 
that someone had his attention fixed on her. Why? 
She could not imagine, but she did not like it. She 
kept very close to Blackbury and his big-muscled, 
dark-brown, savage-looking “boys,” on the way back 
to the boat. 

In the days that followed — the days that, Deirdre 
dreamed, would stretch on and on into a lifetime — 
Conn came often to the Residency island. He was 
always welcome there ; Blackbury made no secret of 
the fact that he liked the “little king” better than his 
own secretary, and would have been glad to make 
an exchange, if Conn had seen the matter in his way. 
But Conn did not. He served no man. . 

He served one woman — the first, apart from 
those light loves that had left no mark on his life; 
the last until that life should end. This he thought, 
as Deirdre thought the days in Meliasi were but the 
first in a long, unbroken string of pearls, stretching 
away and away into the unknown years beyond; 
breaking, and spilling their light upon the earth, 
only when the cord of life should be broken too. . . . 

He was a royal lover. Deirdre found herself say- 


226 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


ing, again and again, after another of his brief visits 
to the island (for they always seemed brief, even 
when they stretched over an afternoon or an eve- 
ning) that he was too good to be true. She had had 
man’s love enough in her life to know how surely its 
honey is mixed and flavoured with the bitter herb 
of selfishness. Only in Conn’s love did there seem 
to be none. He spoke scarcely at all of himself, his 
aims, his present, his past, and very much of her. 
He wanted to know the least things about her life — 
how she had spent her time as a girl in that long-for- 
gotten home, where she had studied music, how it 
came that she understood the Latin of the coat of 
arms he showed her, one day, engraved on an old 
book-plate. 

*^Candide et constanter ^* — a punning reference, 
instantly grasped by her and quickly translated as 
“Spotless and steadfast.” (“You don’t need the 
adverb,” she commented.) 

“Free,” he said, “free, but I like it! Of course 
no one could live up to such a piece of swagger. 
What is yours? I know the crest of several Rogers; 
they seem to run to griffins and — “What’s the 
matter?” 

For Deirdre had suddenly flushed scarlet, and 
then turned very white. How was she to tell him 
her crest? — ^A rose above the brief motto, Norman 
French, “Sans Epines.” (Thornless.) Without the 
name, it had no meaning. She felt herself on the 
verge of a precipice. . . . As to Rogers’ crest, 

she had never thought of it. 

But Conn translated her embarrassment simply 
enough. 

“Everybody hasn’t got a crest, and they are things 
that don’t matter a scrap anyhow,” he said. “Do 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 22^ 

excuse my gassing; I thought perhaps you were in- 
terested, as it’ll be yours.” He turned the subject 
away. “What if we walked under the mango trees 
for a while?” he said. “It’ll be cooler than the 
verandah.” 

She went with him; they were openly affianced 
now, and no one might say them nay. But the day 
was poisoned for her. Under the fiery green of the 
mango domes, where the wind from the sea rushed 
through, and the sound of the sea came up from far 
below, and sea-birds, white and dark-green winged, 
fled by in the glimpses of sun outside, they walked, 
and sat, and walked again, and Conn told her how 
he had looked and waited for her all his eight and 
twenty years, and found her at last. He told her 
how he had been building his house, gathering his 
money, for her, knowing that she must come; how 
it was for her that he had kept his peace about the 
treasure cave on the mainland of Meliasi, and re- 
fused to let anyone share in it, even those he knew 
to be in need. 

“I am no general philanthropist,” he told her. 
“Let those carry out the role whom it suits. I look 
after my own.” 

He told her how he had loved her music long 
before he ever saw or dreamed of seeing her; how 
he had read her soul in it; how he thought her like 
a lily — a lily with a heart of fire. She, drinking in 
his words as a creature athirst, felt them bring no 
coolness to her burning lips — today. What would 
he call her — he, who lived “Candide et constanter” 
— if he knew? 

All the more for the uncertainty, she loved him. 
She loved him so that she could not listen to what 
he said; she seemed to dream away, after a moment, 


228 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


into thinking of him, not of his words, no matter 
what he spoke about. Out of one of these strange 
trances she was plucked by a word^ almost shyly 
spoken, with a half laugh accompanying it. 

. . Wedding. What about it, girlie?” 

She did not know what had gone before. She 
stammered and hesitated in replying. 

‘‘When — what — ” she faltered. 

“I said, what about our wedding? Quiet, of 
course — I know you’d rather not have feathers and 
fuss. Would next week suit you?” 

“Next week?” 

“Any objections? There’s going to be a man- 
of-war in. It might be as well to be married on her. 
You see, the queer state of this place — neither 
British nor French, nor anything else — makes the 
laws a bit dicky, and one doesn’t want to have any 
uncertainty about the legality of the business. But 
on a King’s ship, it’s British, wherever you go. And 
there’s a chaplain, of course. Or what do you say?” 

“Would it be quite — quite usual?” asked Deirdre 
in a low voice, looking at her small red Spanish 
shoes, as she walked. Her mind was in a turmoil. 

What she really wanted to ask, yet could not ask, 
was whether the usual question about obstacles 
would be put. She knew she could nerve herself — 
and her conscience — to go through with the cere- 
mony — all but that. She feared for herself, when 
it came to that solemn pause. She might cry out, or 
burst into tears, or run away. Or — ^worst of all — 
break down and tell the truth. 

“It wasn’t a marriage,” she repeated, obstinately. 
“It hadn’t even the vows and promises. Nothing 
but taking each other for man and wife — and that 
fat old man, sleepy with the porter he’d had for 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


229 


lunch, writing it down, and the two clerks yawning 
and staring. How can that — ” 

But Conn was answering. 

“You mean, of course, is it legal,” he said. “Don’t 
worry your small head a moment. It’s as legal as 
if the Archbishop of Canterbury and six clergy tied 
the knot. You’ll never get away from me agalh, 
even if you want to.” The Idea seemed to please 
him. 

“I suppose you don’t believe In divorce?” ven- 
tured Deirdre. She had always cherished a spark 
of hope that somehow or other. . . . 

^ Conn frowned a little; the lover-light died out In 
his eyes, and an expression almost husbandly took 
its place. 

“My dear child,” he said, “do talk about what 
you understand. What do you know of divorce?” 

“Nothing,” answered Deirdre hastily. (“All the 
same,” she thought, “this is the twentieth century, 
and we don’t go about with blinkers on now-a- 
days.”) 

“I should suppose you didn’t. But I’ll give you 
my ideas, if you want them. It should be allowed, 
for the usual causes, which won’t ever concern you 
and me, and for another — but that needn’t be gone 
Into.” 

“What Is It?” demanded Deirdre. Somehow, she 
thought she knew. 

Conn seemed to answer somewhat under protest. 

“They altered the law. They used to have It 
retrospective long ago, when a man married. But 
one can’t — Never mind those ugly things, little 
sweetheart. I’ve got something to give you.” He 
pulled out a tall Spanish-shaped hair comb, carved 
of solid mother-of-pearl, and exquisitely set with the 


230 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

sea cat’s-eyes that are found in island lagoons — 
strange things of blue and green, large as a shilling. 

“I didn’t dare to make it pearls,” he said, “for 
fear someone might see them, and get to drawing 
conclusions. But you wait and see the necklace 
you’re going to have — one of these days. I’ve been 
matching pearls for it for years.” 

The comb had to be put in place; the giver had to 
be thanked for it, and paid for it. Deirdre, leaving 
her lover, as she always did, with lips throbbing, and 
heart on fire, could find no leisure in her soul for 
thought until long after his steps had died on the 
track, and the oars of his boat beaten away into the 
distance. Later, the memory of his words returned 
to her. She knew what he had meant, when he 
spoke of obsolete laws. He was thinking of the 
old-time law that separated for ever a man from the 
woman who, coming to him, had deceived him. 

“But I should not deceive him !” she cried to her 
soul. And her soul, bitterly, answered her, “Would 
he ever believe that?” “Adrian Shaw did,” she told 
herself. “Adrian Shaw!” answered her self. “A 
man of the world, trained in divorce-court evidence, 
and not — not — so very much in love that he couldn’t 
marry someone else a few weeks after. He was a 
lantern to this man’s flame. You can’t reckon Conn- 
interims of Adrian Shaw.” 

She could not rest; she dared not think. It was 
growing late in the afternoon; the sun was off the 
water. She called Mrs. Carbery, and went down, 
accompanied by the Irishwoman, to Blackbury’s 
bathing pool. 

In the sunset light, it was glorious there. A 
swimmer might have found fault with the extent 
and depth of the pool — Deirdre, in fact, being a 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 231 

good swimmer, did so criticize it — but nothing love- 
lier could have been dreamed of, or made, by 
Nereids or fairies. Larch-green in colour, the sea- 
water, let in through tall brown piles, sipped and 
swayed against its tiny shore of pure white sand. 
Somebody, long ago, had gathered big shells from 
the reef, and set them on this little beach, where 
they would not naturally have been found. 

The sun and the wind had bleached them all to a 
uniform, dazzling white; there they lay, shaped in 
a score of different ways, horned, deep-lipped, fluted, 
set with teeth like combs, beautiful ghosts of shells, 
passing a still, old age in this tideless prison, far 
from the tumble and the surf of the blue-white reefs 
beyond. Over them trailed long arms of pink-blos- 
somed convolvuli and spider lilies shook tall blooms 
behind. The walls of the swimming pool, made of 
piled white coral, were painted with vivid petals. 
That long-ago owner of the island had searched 
the seaward forests for plants that would grow near 
salt water; his gleanings shone all round the pool in 
fresco-work of flowers — curved horns and censers, 
blue as Meliasi harbour; trumpets of waxy gold; a 
rain of dropping scarlet, a Milky Way of white. In 
the unstirred green w^ater, they were reflected as in 
a glass; and among the pictured flowers, below the 
real ones, swam little fish of sapphire colour, of 
barred black and gold, of green and blue striped 
with rose and geranium colour, so that you scarcely, 
on a clear still noontide, could tell which were the 
fish, and which were the flowers. 

This sea-fairies’ home was closely shut in by its 
own walls of coral, and by a thicket of mangroves 
growing right in the tide-water. At no time could 
it be seen from outside, save at the one narrow point 


232 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


where the water of the lagoon rose up at high tide, 
and filled the little pool to over-flowing, leaving it, 
hours later, half-way down its own sandy, weedy 
bed. Just here, there was a fascinating glimpse of 
real deep water, neither green nor blue, filled with 
promise of all coolness and of laving tides. But 
Mrs. Carbery, and also the Commissioner, had 
warned Deirdre not to let herself be tempted over 
the safe shelter of the fence of piles. Sharks had 
never been seen there, but they might be seen at any 
time, and the Meliasi shark was the “tiger” kind, 
large and fierce, and not to be trifled with. Deirdre, 
who knew the South Seas much too well to think in 
earnest of risking herself beyond the fence, never- 
theless chose to grumble a little, on this especial 
afternoon. It had been very hot; the shallow pool, 
eighty degrees or over most of the day, had not had 
time to cool. One might as well have stayed up 
on top and had a hot bath in one’s own room, fretful 
Deirdre maintained. She did not like the pool as 
well as she had thought she did. It was all very 
well to look at, but one wanted to swim — to get a 
long stretch of the “crawl” at high speed, or to 
climb on something and dive. She would get out 
and sit on the coral ; it was cool there, now that the 
sun was going down, and Mrs. Carbery might as 
well come too. 

Mrs. Carbery did, emerging from the bright 
green water in her pre-historic serge gown, like 
some strange monster cast up at neap tide. Deirdre, 
in a smart “Canadian” of black knitted silk, a red 
handkerchief on her head, felt as before, that she 
must offer a remarkable, and not, from her own 
point of view, an unpleasing contrast. She lit a 
cigarette, and rather wished that Conn were within 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


233 


sight of her, instead of being, by now, a couple of 
miles away. 

The last thing she suspected was that he hap- 
pened, at that moment, to be within twenty yards 
of her, resisting, with considerable strength of mind, 
the temptation to play Peeping Tom that had as- 
sailed him, when he heard the splashing and talking 
in the pool. He was far from expecting to meet 
Deirdre down there, at that hour of the evening. 
His own presence was a simple matter enough; it 
was due to the sighting, from his boat, of a big stin- 
garee in the water not very far from the inlet to the 
pool, and his determination to get the thing speared 
by his boys, lest by any extraordinary chance it 
should find its way, gliding between the piles, into 
the nook where Deirdre was in the habit of bathing. 
The fish, however, had betaken itself to deep water 
at once, and shown no sport. Conn meant to hang 
about for a few minutes before starting again, just 
in case the stingaree might once more lift an ugly 
fin out of the water, or lash with its cruel tail. 

Meantime, he sat in the stern of his whaleboat, 
watching the water, and thinking of nothing in par- 
ticular. The voices from the pool woke him out of 
his vague reverie. 

“Little Dear and her dragon,’’ he commented. 
“I’d give a good bit to be looking through those con- 
founded mangroves, somewhere safe. It isn’t done, 
of course. Quite a lot of nice things aren’t done; 
quite a pity, too. Daresay,” the young man’s 
thoughts ran candidly, “she’s dressed a good deal 
more than she’d be at a dance, anyhow.” He waited, 
scanning the sea. “I don’t think it’s going to shore 
again,” was his regretful thought. 

At the edge of the pool, Deirdre and Mrs. Car- 


234 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

bery, cooling themselves in a drift of evening breeze, 
talked. 

“Girl,” said Mrs. Carbery, imparting a curious 
flavour of dress and drawing room to the interview, 
by sitting very upright in her dripping serge, and 
holding her chin well down, as a refined lady should 
do — “girl, I cut the cards for ye last night, and I 
seen throuble in it.” 

“Did you?” countered Deirdre politely. “I hope 
it wasn’t much.” 

“There bid to be a fair man that will cause ye 
sorrow, jewel, and another fair man to that. It’s 
the wonder of the world, the way them fair men do 
be harassing ye. And there’s a journey across the 
wather, and a man from over the says.” 

“We’re all from over the seas here,” objected 
Deirdre frivolously. Mrs. Carbery flowed on. “I 
drew it down that there was misfortune an’ all the 
misfortunateness was workin’ about the card that 
means a weddin’ ring. Disthress an’ sipiration an’ 
all manner. An’ all of it, girleen, it was contagious 
to that card. Sure, Deirdre daughter, ye will nivir 
be for weddin’ a man that will be bringin’ all that 
upon ye. Sure an’ all, I have been feeling in me 
heart there was no luck about the thing at all.” 

Deirdre, reclining slim-legged, black-bodied, 
among the trailing flowers, bit off the head of a small 
white bloom, and made answer, slowly — 

“You know, dear Mrs. Carbery, I don’t believe — 
much — in cards and fortunes — though it’s very kind 
of you to take so much trouble.” 

Mrs. Carbery paused for a moment, sitting 
straighter than ever; she seemed all straight lines, 
with her Noah’s Ark blue gown, and her hair, 
streaked into long tails by the water, and her thin 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 235 

arms set down by her sides, palms resting on the 
rock. 

“I didn’t tell all of it that there was in it,” she 
breathed. *‘Do you choose I would tell you ?” 

Deirdre, who would have given worlds to say 
“No,” felt nevertheless constrained to reply, politely, 
“Yes, do.” She was quite aware that Mrs. Car- 
bery, at times, hypnotized herself into believing that 
the ambiguous signs of the “cards” she worshipped 
were responsible for ideas that had, in reality, some 
other origin. She dreaded the next thing the Irish- 
woman might say. 

“Daughther of Airyan,” proclaimed Mrs. Car- 
bery, “the thing I did be findin’ has me clean 
desthroyed thinkin’ of it, when I’d be awake in my 
bed of a night, and it dark, and there to be a shmall, 
wicked talkin’ in the say, down an’ under. The hair 
of me head crep’ when I thought of it. Daughther, 
it was two weddin’ rings I saw, not wan, and they was 
all through other together.” 

“Two wedding rings!” laughed Deirdre in a high, 
unnatural voice. “How very amusing I” 

Mrs. Carbery lifted eyes, green-grey, heavily 
black-browed, that saw through and through her 
little attempt at evasion. 

“Ye will never be for marryin’ one man, an’ you 
wed to another?” she said, with an immense sim- 
plicity. 

“Who told you I was ever married?” was Deir- 
dre’s last frantic double. 

“There bid to be some myshtery in it, I know 
well,” Mrs. Carbery answered. “A girl ye are, yet 
a married woman ye are, if the cards tells true. But 
whether an’ all, ye’d no right to be weddin’ a man 
who knows no more than the lamb unborn.” 


236 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

“How do you know I didn’t — ” began Delrdre, 
and broke off hurriedly. Mrs. Carbery did not 
pounce upon the admission; it told her nothing new. 
She only looked at Deirdre with her green-grey, 
prophetess eyes, and leaned upon her hands, waiting. 
Deirdre broke through the situation with a violent 
effort. 

“Where’s my cloak? Oh, here — it’s getting too 
cool altogether to be sitting wet through any longer. 
Won’t you get yours and come up? You don’t want 
to get an attack of fever any more than I do. Let 
me — ” She had picked up Mrs. Carbery’s worn 
ulster, and was throwing it round the thin shoulders 
underneath the serge gown. “Now mine.” She flung 
her wrap of brown towelling, red-edged with braid, 
about her; slipped on her shoes, and led the way up 
the steep track to the Residency at such a pace that 
Mrs. Carbery, older by more than a decade, could 
hardly follow. Speech was for the moment impos- 
sible. When they reached the Residency verandah, 
they hurried to their rooms, dripping along the 
floors as they went. Deirdre, in mortal fear of 
further talk — for all that she had made up her mind 
to tell nothing, nothing whatever — ^kept ahead of 
Mrs. Carbery, and fairly bolted into her own room. 
A cool, deliberate sentence followed her — 

“That would be to be a boat we heard, and we 
coming up the avenyey.” 

“Yes,” gasped Deirdre, shutting the door. What 
did a boat, or a hundred boats, matter to her? . . . 

A good part of the night she lay awake, thinking 
matters out. Her room was dim and quiet; the eve- 
ning battalion of mosquitoes hummed for some 
hours outside her close-tucked net, subsiding, to- 
wards dawn, into deceptive quiet. A painty-green 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


237 


frog as big as a pigeon, attracted by the night light, 
posted himself on the edge of the water-jug, and 
now and then broke out with a single, discontented, 
“Roke! roke!” Otherwise, stillness lay upon the 
house and island; she could not even hear the breath- 
ing of sleepers in adjoining rooms, as usual. Mrs. 
Carbery, for all her prophecies and alarms, seemed 
to be resting peacefully; so, big John Bull, not a yard 
away from her, as her bed was placed; so, the house 
boys who slept, for prudence’s sake, on the veran- 
dahs with sawed-off shotguns ready to their hands. 
Nobody was troubling; nobody cared. Only she was 
awake, and miserable. 

She could not disguise from herself, now, that her 
love was endangered. Mrs. Carbery knew nothing, 
but, aided by her never-to-be-sufficiently-cursed for- 
tune telling cards, and the fancies they produced, she 
had come so near the truth at a guess, as to leave 
Deirdre no hope save in outright black lying, and 
that, never having allowed herself more than little 
grey evasions that surely hurt no one, she was very 
loth to face. 

Yet, if she did not face it, she might lose Steve. 
It would be easier, she felt, to die, — if death could 
be met with him. She understood, now, the story 
of the Crown Prince Rudolph that had so intrigued 
her school-girl days — other stories, running on the 
same strange, wild lines, that had seemed to her 
exaggerated, absurd. She knew why lovers chose 
to die together. 

But there was no question of that. No question, 
either, of any trouble at all, if she could only keep 
a ‘‘stiff upper lip,” and deny anything and everything. 
It was, she was quite sure, the kindest course for 
Conn himself. If she were in such a position, she 


238 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


would much rather not know anything that could 
break up her happiness. Conn had strong feelings 
and passions. To hear of an obstacle — an insup — 
well, an obstacle — the very week before his wed- 
ding day, would break his heart, and drive him to 
despair. 

The night waned. John Bull, feeling the chill of 
the hours that verged on dawn, moved restlessly 
on his creaking spring stretcher, and snorted twice 
or thrice in a half snore, almost awake. Mrs. Car- 
bery, on the other side of Deirdre’s room, began to 
talk in her sleep, murmuring something that was part 
prayer, part remonstrance, addressed to Heaven 
knew whom. The painty-green frog, disturbed, 
lifted his head in the dusk of breaking day, and 
called restlessly, “Roke, roke, caroak, caroaki” 
Australian jackasses, in the tops of the cocoanut 
palms, began the ugly note they use in the islands, 
“Rawk, rawk, ronkey, ronkey, ronkey!” A small 
thing with a silver whistle woke up to say that the 
world was good, and the sun undoubtedly rising. On 
the verandah, groans and scufflings, as the light grew 
clear, betrayed the foot of the native “boss boy.” 

‘‘Rousing each caitiff to his task of care.” 

It was another day. With the day, came to 
Deirdre firm resolve. She could keep her secret, 
and she would. 

In the New Cumberlands, as in other Pacific 
islands, there are long stretches wherein nothing 
happens at all; days when everyone, contentedly, 
does nothing from morning until night. This was 
such a day. Blackbury had made ready all his mail 
for the expected man-of-war, that might, and might 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


239 


not, call within a week; Mrs. Carbery had finished 
the last of the colossal socks belonging to her hus- 
band, which she had brought with her for darning. 
Deirdre had never anything to do but a little sewing, 
or a little composing, and she did not feel in tune 
for either, today. She did as the rest did; as Des 
Roseaux, who had wandered in, did also. They sat 
on the front verandah, talking until it was time for 
the eleven o’clock tea that is a sacred institution in 
Pacific lands; then, as the sun was beginning to beat 
hotly, they moved to the back verandah, which 
looked west, and talked again. Then Mrs. Carbery 
wandered with trailing skirt off to the kitchen to see 
that the boys were cooking lunch, and returned with 
the intelligence that they were, but that she had 
had the “divil’s” delight getting that young tory 
of a cook boy to quit out of it, and leave her to 
mix the pudding with her own ten fingers; signs on 
it, he had been eating a snake, away and under the 
house, and he had the smell of it still on him. No- 
body made any comment on this typical happening, 
but Blackbury, Deirdre, and Des Roseaux imme- 
diately broke, one after another, into illustrative 
anecdotes, and by the time the anecdotes were done, 
the lunch, with its rescued pudding, was on the table 
and the day half over. 

Des Roseaux melted away by and by, and Black- 
bury went off for his afternoon sleep. Deirdre, who 
wanted nothing less than a tete-a tete with Mrs. Car- 
bery, fled to a side verandah where no one, almost, 
ever sat, found herself a long chair, and settled 
down for a quiet afternoon. It was scarcely three 
o’clock; visitors were rare, and none, in any case, 
need be expected for at least an hour. She had, in 
all probability, four hours of uninterrupted peace 


240 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


before her; even Steve was not likely to come today, 
since he had been to the Residency the day before. 
There was a murmuring of music in her ears, this 
last hour or so; a dancing and beating of swift, 
sweet measures. If she had the afternoon entirely 
to herself — with the piano in the sitting room at 
hand — she did not know but she might — 

Why, that was Conn’s whaleboat — surely — creep- 
ing over, like a many-legged water-beetle, from dis- 
tant Wawa Island. It could be none but his or Des 
Roseaux’s, and Des Roseaux had only just left the 
Residency. Deirdre swung her feet off the long 
chair, and ran to Blackbury’s telescope stand. Yes, 
it was Conn. She could see the white figure in the 
stern, and recognize the uniform of the crew — dark 
blue jumper and tunic, with a sash of emerald green. 

There was, of course, only one thing to do — hurry 
into the bedroom, hunt out a lacy, cloudy dress with 
graceful hanging sleeves, pat the dark-bronze masses 
of hair into more perfect form, and add a touch, a 
very discreet touch, of Deirdre’s own particular lilac 
perfume. She always used a delicate lilac, when she 
used any scent at all — on the grounds that she was 
“simply sick” of violet, in books and out of them. 

The side verandah would do. It was quiet. . . . 
Was it not delightful of him to come all those miles 
again so soon? But there never had been, there 
never would be, a lover like Stephen Conn. More 
than ever, the urge of music, not yet formed or ex- 
pressed, swelled like a tide in her heart. She found 
herself humming fragments as she moved about her 
room — a first line, words and music, as she twisted 
up her hair; a refrain, suddenly leaping into life 
complete as she fastened the last snap of her 
prettiest dress. It was going to be “some song,” this 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


241 


latest born of hers. She hadn’t written one for 
months, but this would make up. The last phrase 
sounded in her ears as she closed her door, and 
stepped out on the verandah to see whether the boat 
had yet come under the lee of the island. . . . Oh, 
it would be a splendid song! 

Yes, the boat had evidently come in; it was not 
to be seen. In another two or three minutes, she 
would hear Steve Conn’s step — his unmistakeable, 
light swift foot — coming up the crackling coral walk. 
She would catch the first glimpse of the hard, strong 
face, that softened only for her, the diamond-grey 
eyes beneath the eaves of the big sun helmet, before 
he caught sight of herself; she would look through 
the chinks of the bamboo sun blinds, and laugh to 
see him scanning the front of the house, wondering 
where she might be. . . . Only another minute now 
at most. Only half a minute. Now — ^now. Surely 
that was his step — ^was it? Someone, undoubtedly, 
was coming up the walk — oh — a native. A native — 
with a note. 

She was not vexed, not alarmed. There was no 
reason for either. The note might be for anyone; 
might mean anything or nothing at all. . . . But 
somehow, mysteriously, the pace of things seemed 
to have slowed down. The world was rushing no 
longer. It crept. 

The note was for herself. The boy was one of 
Conn’s. 

She met him at the steps, took the letter from 
him, and went into her room to open it. She did 
not feel frightened — not at all — what was there to 
be frightened at? — But, oddly, her knees seemed to 
be frightened. They shook. She was amused at 
her knees. . . . 


242 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

She opened the letter. The envelope had been 
gummed down closely; it wouldn’t tear at first. She 
had to get a hatpin from the dressing table. Then 
she saw that her hands were frightened. They were 
trembling, and looked cold. But she was quite calm. 

The letter was very short; she seemed to read it 
all at once, in a single look. But she could not un- 
derstand it. 

‘‘Will you come down to the boathouse if you can? I 
want to talk to you. S. Conn.’^ 

The boy, outside, asked if he was to wait. “No,” 
she called, and he went away. 

What did it mean? She laid the note down on 
the dressing table, and looked at it. It seemed as 
if she could not stop looking at it. Her hat was 
hanging on the mirror; she pinned it on, all the time 
staring at the note, so that she ran the pin into her 
head, and hurt herself. She snatched it out, and 
replaced it, glancing at the glass this time. The 
girl in the glass stared hard and strangely; her eyes 
seemed very big, but that was because her face had 
turned so white. Why was she looking like that? 

. There was gravel under her feet — coral 
gravel. The wind from the sea blew up into her 
face, and ruffled her dress. She held it against the 
breeze. It was a windy-gold afternoon, full of the 
calling, insistent life that is nowhere so inescapeable 
as about the tropic world. A day to live in; a day 
to meet good fortune with a smile and outstretched 
hands. The day when she and Conn had pledged 
their love had been a day of brooding storms; dusk 
coming down with a cruel face and angry muttering 
cries. She did not know why she thought of it. 
She could not catch the consoling analogy she 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 243 

wanted, though she felt, dimly, that it was thefe. 
She could only hasten down the coral path to the 
boathouse, thoughts tumbling and tripping over one 
another. Why had he not come up to the house? 
Why had he written such a letter? . . . That was 
a huge butterfly I It must be as big as a swallow — 
red spots on its wings — they did not often come to 
the island. . . . Conn’s boat — lying out from shore 
— now, the boathouse, standing alone, on a space 
of sun-caked sand. . . . They must have put it there 
to be safe from fire; odd, she had never thought of 
that. A quiet place. A place where there could 
be no eavesdroppers. Up on the top of the island, 
among the shrubs and trees, one never knew. . . . 
Was that the reason? And if it were, yet why — 
Oh — there he was, under the black-silk shadow of 
the bathhouse roof. Sitting on the edge of Black- 
bury’s drawn-up whaleboat. He did not see her; 
she could not see his face, because his helmet was 
on. . . . 

Conn, under the boathouse roof, heard the light, 
hurried footsteps coming. Instantly he rose, and 
took off his sun helmet. 

“I must apologize,” were the first words that 
she heard. “I shouldn’t have brought you down 
here if it could have been helped. I wanted to talk 
quite privately.”^ 

“Yes,” she said, swallowing down something in 
her throat. They stood and looked at one another. 
Conn was so deeply tanned that no pallor could 
show on his hard face, but his lips, commonly red, 
were yellow-white. She noticed that. “Something 
dreadful is going to happen,” she thought. 

“Will you sit down?” he said, offering his hand 
to help her into the whaleboat. He was terribly 


244 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

polite. He had not asked to kiss her; his hand — 
that hand that had been used to cling to hers as 
steel leaps and clings to the magnet — barely touched 
her, as he lifted her by the elbow. He did not 
sit down himself. He stood beside the whaleboat, 
on the sand, not very near to her. She had never 
before realized his height — his strength. He made 
her feel like a “reed shaken in the wind.” . . . 

“This is not Steve,” she thought. Her woman’s 
soul ached for her protecting lover. This steel-eyed 
judge who stood aloof — who was he? 

“I wanted to tell you something,” were his first 
words. They gave her a shock of surprise. She had 
thought — oh — he was going on. 

“I wanted to let you know I was in my boat, 
last evening, when you and Mrs. Carbery were bath- 
ing. I heard a good deal of what you and she said. I 
wish to apologize for doing such a disgraceful 
thing.” 

He paused for a moment, evidently collecting his 
words. 

“It was a temptation — I didn’t think I could have 
— ^but that doesn’t matter. We can assume I’m a 
cad if you like. It can’t alter what I heard. What 
did she mean — that woman — ^by saying you were 
married? Is it true?” 

She would have given ten years — anything — to 
be able to lie. She had lied before — she did not 
palter with herself, now, by calling it evasion, fib- 
bing. But to Conn, had her life been forfeit, she 
could not. 

“Yes,” she said, and seemed to hear the word 
explode like dynamite, shattering her world. 

She had been mistaken, it seemed, in thinking that 
Conn’s burned skin could show no change of colour. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


245 


It changed now, to a dusk, ugly yellow. He looked, 
all in one moment, like a man who has been sick 
a week. 

“Is your husband alive?” 

“Yes.” (She knew he was. The doctor would 
have told her. . . .) 

“When did you hear of him last?” 

“Two years — let me speak, Steve. I must speak.” 

“You can speak when Tm done. I want to know 
how you dared.” 

“I — dared? I don’t — ” 

“Yes, you do. You understand quite well. I want 
to know what made you think I was going to com- 
mit bigamy for any woman alive. What had I 
ever — Good God, and I thought I wasn’t worthy 
to touch your dress !” 

“Oh, you won’t listen, and you don’t understand,” 
cried Deirdre, fighting back tears. “It was a — it 
was only a — ” 

“Was it a legal marriage? Church or registry?” 

“It was registry.” 

“And you never had a divorce?” 

“No — no. There wasn’t — ” 

“Had you thought of getting one? Not that I — 
but there would have been some excuse.” 

“Why, no, Steve. Steve, don’t look at me like 
that. I’ve done nothing. No, there was never any 
chance of a divorce. It wasn’t a real marriage, it 
was only a student marriage — like Sonia Kova- 
levsky — ” 

“Who?” 

“The Russian mathematician, you know. She — ” 

“I don’t know. I don’t take any interest in 
Nihilism. I don’t see what it’s got to do with you 
and me. You let me ask you to marry me, and ac- 


246 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


cepted me, and we were to have been — ” He 
stopped and seemed to fight for self-composure. In 
a moment he went on — she had not dared to inter- 
rupt — “And you meant to make my sons — ^my sons ! 
— ^you meant to make them — ” He hesitated over 
the word, so seldom used before a decent woman. 
Deirdre, seizing the opportunity, broke in. She was 
crying now, her breast heaving, tears running down, 
but Conn did not even seem to see it. 

“You’re cruel — ^you beat one down. You must 
listen.” She was almost choking with tears. “Steve 
— why won’t you understand? It was to get my 
property — and he only did it — to help — and he left 
me as soon as the register was signed. And I — ” 
“You want me to believe that — that the man 
who married you went off and deserted you as soon 
as it was done?” 

“Yes, yes, Steve. It was — ” 

“And that you never saw him since?” 

“Yes,” said Deirdre, stopping her tears. Was 
there — could there be — hope? 

“You can tell that,” said Conn, his face yellow- 
white with fury, “you can tell that to the marines.” 

He turned his back on her, and went with great 
steps across the sand, down to the spot where his 
boat was lying in the tide. She could not believe 
that he was going — like that — without a word. She 
could not believe it even when she saw him swing 
into the boat, and order the boys to shove away. 
He would turn — come back. . . . 

He did not. The crew, sensing something un- 
usual and dangerous in the air, reached out over 
their oars and pulled as if contesting a race. The 
whaleboat left a creaming wake behind it, on the 
glass-green of the lagoon. Soon it looked like a 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 247 

pointer — a long thin pointer, showing the way to 
the passage in the reef. The boat nosed straight 
for the break in the tumbling foam, took it, and was 
away, rocking, on the open sea. 

Deirdre found she was on the beach; she had no 
recollection of getting out of the boat or leaving 
the boathouse. There was an immense calophyllum 
tree near her, rooted in sand, and spreading its enor- 
mous arms, each one a separate forest, out above the 
water. Flowers, white and golden, exquisitely 
scented, fell into the tide at her feet, and came sway- 
ing back on the fringe of each long ripple. “I shall 
never like them again,” she thought, looking at 
the lovely things with a cold sick feeling. Steve 
was gone; Steve who had been hers. What was 
to do? God, God, what a night she was going 
to have! 

It was near sunset now. She did not dare venture 
into the house; she felt as if going mad. She would 
take her bathing suit from the back-yard, and slip 
down to the swimming pool; that would be a good 
way of escaping from eyes and tongues — for the 
present. After — oh, how was she going to face 
dinner? How spend the awful night, in that room 
she hated so? “Roke, roke!” She could hear the 
horrible green frog, hiding among the basins — could 
imagine the muttering of Mrs. Carbery on one side, 
the creaking of Blackbury’s bed on the other. The 
hatred of familiar things that comes upon one struck 
by sudden sorrow lay heavy upon her. . . . 

And least, last of all did she guess at the wild 
longing for that safe, quiet room, that was to beset 
her, in the night that lay in real truth before her. 


248 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


She gained the yard unseen, and found her dress. 
Her bathing cloak was with it; she swung it over 
her arm and took her red bathing cap. Afterwards 
she was to remember these things; she was to have 
cause. 

Again a blank, filled with wild efforts to keep 
back the terrible tears that threatened to lay her low 
as a thunder-shower lays low the herbage and the 
flowers. She did not know how she had reached the 
swimming pool, but here it was, and here was she 
with half her clothes off, and strewn about the rocks 
that bordered the pool. Why was she doing this? 
Why not? There were to be no whys in her life 
hereafter. She was to drift, drift always, down the 
lonely ways of time. What had she been composing 
that afternoon? She could not tell. It was wiped 
out of her mind; gone, as if it had never existed. 
Was she going mad? She almost hoped so. 

She had got into her bathing dress without know- 
ing; her fingers were fastening the shoulder buttons. 
Should she dive in ? Swim? Stay on the edge ? She 
could not tell what she was going to do. The springs 
that ’vyorked her life seemed broken. She found her- 
self, presently, sitting on the rocks, back to the tide- 
way entrance, face to the flowers and the land, crying 
— crying terribly at last. 


There was a canoe outside the swimming bath. 

Sunset had seen for some days past the same 
canoe, hovering in the same place. It had been there 
on the previous evening when Conn and his whale- 
boat made their call. Conn had noticed it, without 
particular interest — except in so far as he had ob- 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 249 

served that the native paddler was fishing in water 
shallower than that generally chosen by the New 
Cumberland folk. Reef fish are not, by a long way, 
so good to eat as the firmer deep-sea fish that live 
outside lagoons. 

He might have noticed — had he not been taken 
up with other things — that the canoe was quite un- 
usually big for a single paddler, and that it had a 
heap of nets in the bottom; an odd outfit — if one 
thought of it — for a native who was apparently 
fishing with hook and line. But no one about 
Meliasi took any particular notice of natives unless 
they made themselves troublesome. Conn, certainly, 
had other things to think of. 

The canoe was there, when he made his wild dash 
away from Residency island, this second evening, 
half blind with misery and rage. He almost ran 
it down, steering the whaleboat for the reef-passage. 
He saw nothing but the open sea, felt nothing but 
his own mad desire to get away from the place and 
all it held. The paddler had to work his hardest 
to clear Conn’s track in time. He stopped, when 
the big boat was safely out of the way, and, staring 
after it, made a remark in broken English to the 
effect that the Little King seemed angry, and it must 
be his woman he was angry with, since he had been 
in the boathouse with her for half an hour. 

‘‘Angry?” chuckled the voice of a person invisible. 
“He wild, that fellow Conn? He been row along 
him missus? Very good. Me too much like.” 

“Altogether he wild,” affirmed the native, pad- 
dling slowly, with his eye on the belt of mangroves 
that concealed the swimming bath. “Me think him 
been close-up fight along him missus.” 


250 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

A whale-spout of delighted swearing from the pile 
of fishing nets, in reply. The native, who had been 
long enough with whites to understand most of it, 
burst out laughing. 

“ ’Fore God, massa,” he declared, savvy 

too much dam.” 

“Hold your row,” said the voice, suddenly care- 
ful. “We come up close.” 

“This fellow Mary him no coming. By-’n’-by him 
come.” 

“You takem line,” ordered the voice. “You make 
all same catchem fish. Close up you go, longside 
mangrove, you wait. By-’n’-by this missus you 
hearem come, you go inside mangrove, look-see.” 

The native nodded. They were nearing the man- 
grove trunks; the great trees, eighty and a hundred 
feet high, stood in densely shaded water, sur- 
rounded by their million growing children. In and 
out the paddler worked the canoe, avoiding with 
care the spear-like prominences of iron hard young 
shoots, and the blind alleys among the knitted black 
stems that led only into difficulties. Progress was 
slow; the invisible somebody, hidden underneath the 
nets, kicked restlessly about, and yawned once or 
twice. 

“Five nights, five nights,” came a humming mur- 
mur. “Oh, blanky blank, five nights. Oh, John 
Stanley Winton Fursey, five blanky blank nights 
here, and two on the dancing ground, and no girl. 
Oh, Johnny John, go home and boil your head, for 
you’re no good.” Then the tone changed; the mur- 
mur — ^low and cautious always — addressed itself to 
the native paddler. “Hold on, you black devil ; easy 
as she goes. I hearem this fellow Mary she come.” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


251 


The paddler became a statue of bronze. 

“Masser,” he whispered, without moving his 
head. “All right dis time. One Mary coming. No 
two.” 

^^Hold on,” came the warning whisper. They 
waited. In a minute or two, responding to Fursey’s 
touch on his foot, the native glided forward. It was 
possible to see between the mangrove stems now, 
if one advanced noiselessly. 

“What you see?” 

“Masser, me see one fellow Mary, him sit down, 
too much cry.” 

“Calico (clothes) him takem off?” 

“Calico belong swim, him havem, masser. Black 
calico. Him no swim. Him sit down, him cry.” 

“Good. Hold on. Suppose I no find you here 
when I come back, then I cut off your two ears, make 
you eat them.” 

“I stop, Tore God I stop, masser.” 

“Mind you do.” Fursey had risen up from under 
the mass of fishing nets; he slung himself, noise- 
lessly, over the edge of the canoe. Barefooted, he 
crept along the wall of piled coral that edged the 
inlet to the bath ; the blocks were large, and he found 
footing easily, protected by the height of the wall. 
At the entrance he paused, peeping cautiously be- 
tween the piles that guarded the bath from roam- 
ing sharks and swordfish. 

“A cinch,” he murmured delightedly, looking at 
Deirdre’s unconscious figure. Fursey was a keen 
reader of Wild West literature, and deliberately 
adopted both its dress and its language at times. 
There was a strong strain of the “movie” actor in 
the queer little scoundrel. For the job of this 


252 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

evening, he had got himself up in red shirt, rough 
breeches of dungaree, a belt stocked with knives and 
pistols, and a Buffalo Bill hat. He quite saw him- 
self on a magazine cover as “Bad Bill of Nevada” 
or “The Terror of Red Gulch.” Strangers had 
been known to set down this vain little chunk of 
flesh as a mere incarnate joke; a negligible piece of 
stuff and swagger. . . . 

There was a red handkerchief tied about his neck, 
cowboy fashion. He loosened it as he crept for- 
ward, and held it between his teeth, swinging free. 
Deirdre’s black figure was only a yard from him 
now. He had made no noise, but she was crying 
so bitterly, shoulders heaving, face hidden between 
her hands, that she would not, in all likelihood, have 
heard him even had he tramped across the coral 
rock, or shouted. 

The sun, sinking down beyond the lagoon, shot 
up a last jet of light among the trees, and disap- 
peared. Fursey, handkerchief now shifted to one 
hand, deliberately waited. Time enough for a few 
minutes more; best to let the light sink a little. It 
would be dark in a jiffy. . . . 

Deirdre cried on. Her world had sunk away 
under her feet; Steve — Steve I — had spoken to her 
cruelly, looked at her like an enemy, left her. What 
was she going to do? What was she to live for? 
She did not care what became of her now. . . . 

Many a girl has said as much to herself. Few 
have the statement challenged as promptly as befell 
to Deirdre. For just at the moment when the words 
were forming themselves in her mind, the falling 
dusk leaped suddenly to dark; something was thrust 
into her mouth, stifling her instant frightened cry; 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 253 

an arm like a belt of steel caught her about the body. 
She felt herself swung off her feet, and carried. She 
tried to fight, to scream — it seemed that, after all, 
what happened to her did matter, enormously — ^but 
the handkerchief half choked her, and the powerful 
arm held her as a python holds a rabbit. There 
was a period of swinging about and scrambling, dur- 
ing which she did not cease to fight, fiercely, uselessly 
— then she felt herself lowered into something that 
smelt damp and felt woody and hard. Her hands 
were swiftly tied; the handkerchief was readjusted, 
so that she could breathe with a fair amount of 
freedom, but could neither see nor speak. A pile 
of something soft was laid on top of her. She felt 
the motion of a canoe ; heard the low, cautious beat 
of its paddle; was conscious of a freshening current 
of air, penetrating the nets that lay over her. 

Fursey, sitting upright in the canoe, and keeping 
a sharp look-out, chuckled to himself, as he sped 
with his capture on towards Wawaka Island. 


CHAPTER XIII 


I N the pearlers’ hall, on the top of Wawaka 
Island, there was never silence. 

During the day, when the sloops were out on the 
lagoon, the cook boys made the place their own 
chattering as only natives and monkeys can chatter, 
breaking firewood, eating, shouting, fighting. They 
kept a sentry posted on the top of the island to give 
warning of the fleet’s return; when that was sig- 
nalled, they drove away their women ; ran for cocoa- 
nut brooms, swept out the worst of the day’s accu- 
mulated rubbish, and set the pots a-boiling, all in 
the midst of chattering and clamour, that ceased like 
a sound shut off by a door, the moment their masters 
arrived. Then, the pearlers themselves, with loud 
talking, cursing, calls to one boy and another, took 
up the tale of noise. By lantern light and firelight, 
later on, there would be card-playing and dicing, 
and shouts of those who lost and won. The day’s 
catch of pearls would change hands ; someone would 
accuse someone else of cheating; knives would be 
drawn, perhaps used. . . . 

Men asleep on their scattered beds, fires down 
to white dust of ashes, black darkness in the roof, 
moonlight pouring through the doorways — there 
was, even yet, no stillness. Always, in this huge 
rough house, the wind was playing tricks somewhere 
or other — flapping a loose section of thatch, among 
2S4 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 255 

the hundreds that made up the roof; beating a 
branch of eucalyptus or oleander against the wat- 
tled walls ; screaming through some gap, with a wail 
like dogs baying at the moon ; thundering, on nights 
when the wild north-west was up, from one end of 
the place to another, and driving before it torn 
leaves of the cocoanut palms, and bits of broken 
coral from the path outside, over the sleepers’ beds. 
Certainly, Wawaka was not peaceful. 

. . . Through the noises of the night, with the 
huge black roof above her, and the marigold-col- 
oured light of the swung lantern making strange pat- 
terns on the walls, Deirdre watched. She did not 
sleep. She did not feel as if she ever would sleep 
again, this side of the grave. 

She was penned in a tiny enclosure of cocoanut 
leaf screens, that stood in one corner of the hall. 
She was not fettered in any way, but Kalaka, Fur- 
sey’s girl, was sleeping beside her, one sturdy 
bronze-coloured arm thrown round her waist. Kal- 
aka was snoring hard; nevertheless, the least move- 
ment on Deirdre’s part caused the snores to cease, 
and if the movement were repeated, Kalaka would 
wake, and tell the white woman, angrily, to keep 
quiet. . . . 

How long was it since she had been carried, 
wrapped in a bundle of fishing nets, from Fursey’s 
canoe to the pearlers’ hall? — where the men were 
coming in from the day’s work, strolling, cooking, 
drinking, lying about — where Fursey, with a yell, 
had set her on her unsteady feet, pulled off the nets, 
and shouted to the men to look what a fine fish he 
had caught! 

It seemed a week. It was possibly five hours — 
eight o’clock when they landed her, no doubt, and 


256 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


now it was after one in the morning, by the sinking 
of the moon. 

She had made a strange and a very lovely pic- 
ture, had she but known it, standing there, all white 
and black in her black Canadian swimming dress, 
cloudy-dark hair down about 'her shoulders, dark, 
desperate eyes staring out of a small, marble face. 
Fursey kept firm hold of her arm, as if he thought 
she might take wing, and seemed to hold her forth 
and show her to the crowd, as he would have shown 
a newly-purchased dog or horse. 

“Some girl, believe me,” he had said, in the Wild 
West idiom he affected. “Conn’s girl, this is. 
Conn’s girl, whom he told where he’s got his mine, 
and what’s in it. They’re dragging the swimming 
bath for her corpse at this very minute.” He let 
out a crash of laughter. He kept tight hold of her 
arm; she wondered if he knew how much his grip 
was hurting her. She saw the pearlers’ faces as a 
mist full of eyes; she felt dazed and giddy, and 
would have fallen but for Fursey’s hold. The men 
were staring, shouting; she saw beards wag, and 
teeth behind wide grins, now; they were talking — 
about her. . . . 

“Who says so?” yelled Fursey suddenly. “Who 
says it’s too damned mean? Show him to me !” 

She had not seen his hand move, but there it was, 
stretched out — the right hand; he was holding her 
with the left — and in it there was an automatic pis- 
tol, that had come from — where? 

The men knew; they knew that Fursey, partly 
through natural ability, and partly by dint of end- 
less practice, could draw and aim the Colt he al- 
ways carried about as quickly as a cat can strike at 
the eyes of a dog. Nobody answered his furious 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 257 

question. Deirdre felt a little contemptuous of it; 
she thought, so far as she could think at such a 
moment, that he was simply “showing off.” . . . 
And why was he aiming? There was nothing, by 
his own words, to aim at. 

Then she saw the reflection of her own white 
fear in another face — ^the face of a youngish man, 
at the far end of the hall — and realized, instantly, 
that Fursey’s question had been purely rhetorical, 
for he was aiming, with a deadly certainty, at the 
head of the youngish man. 

In a moment, the whole hall fell to silence. The 
wind blattered at the doorway; there was a sound 
of clinking coral, as a native’s bare foot moved 
stealthily outside. 

“It was you, I believe, who said the capture of 
this young lady was too damned mean?” asked Fuf- 
sey, with a giggling politeness. The youngish man 
turned his head from side to side, looking for es- 
cape. The others swung loose of him, right and 
left, and bunched together, staring. . . . 

Deirdre flung her hands to her ears; the pistol 
had gone off almost in her face. Through the muf- 
fling palms, she heard a shriek, almost a howl. The 
youngish man was running about, doubled up, his 
hand upon the side of his head. He dropped it, 
and she saw, in the lamp light, dark blood on his 
neck and shirt. Where his ear had been there 
was nothing but a lobe and a hole. 

Fursey giggled again. 

“Any complaints?^* he shouted, in the tone of an 
orderly officer going rounds. 

No one answered. The wounded man sat down 
on the ground rocking himself backward and for- 
ward, his hand to the place where his ear had been. 


258 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

A brown woman, by and by, a small terrified thing 
wearing almost no clothes, slipped out from some- 
where, and coaxed him away. . . . 

Fursey looked round the dusk, lamp-lit hall again. 

“Now, if nobody has anything more to say,” he 
remarked, “I’ll go on where I was interrupted. 
This young lady is to pay us a little visit. I’m sure 
we shall all 'be very polite to her, unless she gives 
us cause to be otherwise, and she’d hardly be so 
foolish as to do that — hey, my dear?” 

He seemed to expect the girl to answer him, but 
she could find no words. “This isn’t true,” she 
was telling herself. “This is a bad dream; I must 
have got an attack of fever. I’ll wake up in a 
minute, and hear the frog on the wash-basin — and 
Mrs. Carbery snoring. It’s a dream. Oh God, 
help me to wake up — I don’t like it; I can’t bear 
any more of it.” 

The night was hot, but she began to shiver as 
she stood. This dream — if it was a dream — if it 
was a dream I — made all her limbs feel weak, and 
took her voice away. Perhaps she was dying in 
her sleep. She had heard of such things. . . . 
More and more she shook. 

“Kalaka!” roared Fursey, in the immense voice 
that went so ill with his small stature. “Kalaka! 
Bring some of your clothes. This lady is cold.” 

The girl Kalaka came out. She was fat, sullen, 
scared looking; a handsome creature, with savage 
black eyes, and a mop of silky curls that told of 
some Malay cross in her ancestry, the New Cum- 
berland heads being woolly. She was gorgeously 
dressed for a native, with petticoat of crimson silk, 
and short bedgown of yellow; there were gold rings 
on her arms, and a band of gold across her hair. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 259 

She stared Deirdre, essence of concentrated hate 
in her sparkling eyes. Fursey told her again to get 
some clothes. Slowly she obeyed, returning with a 
long loose gown of green print, which she flung over 
the white girl’s head. 

Deirdre had scarce been conscious of her lightly 
clad condition, but she was relieved to feel her- 
self completely covered again; the eyes of these 
men were like burning glasses fixed upon her, as 
she stood under the lamp in her bathing dress, 
hands still fastened with Fursey’s handkerchief. 
This last the owner removed, throwing it behind 
him. 

“Give her some supper,” he said to Kalaka. “She 
sleep along you, you hold her fast. Suppose you 
let her go, me I take you on top Wawaka, throw 
you over, all same I did Maiva.” He thrust his 
face almost into Kalaka’s and glared at her. The 
girl winced away from him. 

“You come,” she said, nipping the white girl’s 
arm tightly into hers. She cast another of her 
looks of hate at Deirdre, as she led ’her to a kitchen 
shed outside. There was cold rice on a plate; she 
offered it to Deirdre, but the latter shook her head. 
“Water, please,” she begged. Kalaka brought it 
in a tin, und watched her as she drank. 

“If you let me go,” said Deirdre, putting down 
the tin, and re-assembling all the courage she could 
find, “if you let me go, I will give you so much 
money you will never want any again.” She glanced 
out at the darkened world beyond the cook-shed. 
Surely it might be possible — since Fursey had been 
so foolish as to leave her in charge of a mere woman 
like herself — to make her escape! This was no 
dream. This was a horrible reality, on which she 


26 o conn of the coral SEAS 


scarcely dared to allow her mind to dwell. She 
fixed it on one point — to get away. 

But Kalaka shook her curling head as if she 
would shake it off. 

“Why for I die for you? I no such fool,’’ she 
said, following up her words with a rattle of Fur- 
sey’s own particular language that made Deirdre’s 
blood run cold — so horrible it sounded in the mouth 
of a young girl. 

“He’d never dare to — ” 

“He do anyt’ing. You hearem me. Anyt’ing. 
Dat Maiva — ” 

“What of her?” 

“She here — ^before me. He steal her from one 
village in mountain, same he steal me. He tell 
Maiva — ‘Suppose you go along another man, by- 
an’-by I f row you.’ ... You come; I show.” 

With savage impetuosity, she seized Deirdre’s 
hand, and rushed her out of the cookhouse, a very 
little way, to where the ground beneath their feet 
suddenly broke off into a void of winking stars. A 
strong salt breeze from the sea came whirling up, 
billowing Kalaka’s royal robes, and Deirdre’s cot- 
ton dress. 

“Look down,” came Kalaka’s voice. Deirdre 
did not dare; she heard the waves bursting on the 
coral a long, long way below, and she could sense, 
rather than see, that the edge was very near. 

“Take me away,” she begged, shivering. 

“Dey take Maiva,” went on the girl in a hushed 
voice, “dey take her long her dress — so — ” 

She caught at Deirdre’s skirts, and made as if 
she would swing her by them. Deirdre hurriedly 
shrank back. 

“Dey make her go — one — two — tree — an’ ha- 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 261 


way!” Kalaka flung out her hands, and gazed 
down, as if indeed she saw the body of the doomed 
girl, turning and whirling in the empty air. 

“You been hearem one orange fall down from 
big, beeg orange tree? Dis all same. Maiva she 
fall, she come down — Waksh!” With ghastly ver- 
isimilitude. ‘“Maiva she spill, all same orange. 
You think Kalaka dam fool? You want she go 
‘Waksh, too?’ ” 

“What did they do it for?” asked Deirdre, in 
a low voice of horror. 

“She make gammon along another man,” ex- 
plained Kalaka carelessly. “No good make gam- 
mon Fursey. You come back.” 

“Look here, girl,” cried Deirdre, in despair, “do 
you want me to stay? Aren’t you afraid your Fur- 
sey will like me better than you?” 

She hated herself for the suggestion, but she 
could not miss any chance. Besides, she thought 
she had read a story somewhere. . . . 

Kalaka laughed. “I no ’fraid,” she explained, 
“ ’cause I stick you all-a-same figg, (pig) suppose 
Fursey like you. Come back.” She jerked the 
captive along to the hall again. And Deirdre, tast- 
ing the bitterness of despair, submitted. At all 
events, if the worst came to the worst, there was 
that rock. It might be she would welcome it, in the 
end. 

Fursey, who seemed to have made definite plans 
and to be acting on them, ordered Kalaka at once 
to take Deirdre into her own little screened-off 
sleeping corner, and to keep her there till the morn- 
ing. He joined the pearlers after, and they threw 
dice, one by one, for the larger pearls of the day’s 
catch. They made a great deal of noise over it. 


262 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


and quarrelled not a little, but there was no more 
bloodshed — towards which desirable end, the ab- 
sence of spirits no doubt contributed. Fursey, in 
pursuance of the plan he communicated to no one, 
had barred them for the evening. Beer was drunk 
by cases; before long, half the men had fallen into 
a muddled sleep where they sat, and the rest were 
drowsy. Fursey, himself, put out all the lights but 
one — that which hung, like a beacon, at the entrance 
to the screened corner where Deirdre and Kalaka 
lay. 

Towards dawn, the wind fell, and the grateful 
silence, helped by the chill that goes before break- 
ing day, soothed Deirdre into sleep. Worn out, 
she slept heavily, and did not wake till after eight 
o’clock. The clamour of a fierce dispute among 
the pearling men aroused her. They had break- 
fasted, and were gathered together near the door- 
way, arguing some point with their ugly little chief. 
Until the matter was settled, it seemed, none of 
them would go out with the boats. 

Deirdre had awaked too late to hear the cause 
of the dispute ; she only caught the answer that Fur- 
sey was making. 

. . What would you have, boys? Where 

could the little tart be safer than she is up here, 
with Kalaka looking after her, and Child and me 
seeing she doesn’t get away till she’s told us what 
we want to know?” 

He was m-ilder now than when the wretched lad 
with the shot-off ear had opposed him, the night 
before. No one like Fursey to feel the mouths of 
his wild team; to know when reins should be held 
tight, and when they must, for a moment, be loos- 
ened. There was fretting on the bit this morning; 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 263 

he felt it, and gave to the pull. But his lip, below 
the cat-like moustache, was nipped hard in, and one 
thought kept making furious circles in his mind, 
again and again. “Wait. You wait. I know who this 
is. Oh, wait till I get you!” 

Still, he spoke them fair. 

“No one’s got any reason for harming her. 
We’ll tell her — are you listening, Deirdre?” 

Kalaka nudged her to reply. “Yes,” she called 
feebly, from behind her screen. 

“Then listen to this — and you, boys, listen, too. 
We want to know where Conn’s mine is, and we 
know she knows. She’s only got to tell us, and she 
can go home that minute. What’s in that to make 
a fuss about?” 

“What are you going to” — “Tell us — ” broke 
from half a dozen men together. Fursey held up 
his hand for silence. 

“Child can tell me,” he said. His face was as 
sweet as cream, all but the bitten lip that nobody 
could see. 

“They want to know,” spoke Child, leaning with 
his immense slack bulk against one of the tree-trunk 
pillars of the house — “they want to know how yoy 
propose to act, if she doesn’t tell.” 

“Oh, you needn’t worry. I don’t want to get 
the blanky man-of-war after us. If she won’t tell 
for politeness, she’ll tell for love.” 

“What do you mean by that?” 

For answer, Fursey beckoned to the man named 
Smith. 

“You can talk,” he said. 

“What do you want me to say?” grumbled the 
creature. He was one of the worst wrecks of that 
assembly of human wreckage, a stooping, red-nosed 


264 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

thing, with a painful air of past gentility about him. 
He stared at Fursey with watery, ineffective dis- 
like. 

“When your name wasn’.t Smith,” said Fursey, 
“what was it?” 

“Tritton,” grunted the man. Some of the pearl- 
ers shifted about, and exclaimed. 

“That’s the chap,” said Fursey. “You were a 
missionary here when you first came up, weren’t 
you?” 

“What if I was?” 

“We won’t say what they chucked you out for, 
or where you’d be if this was a Crown Colony, with 
police. You can just tell us,, were you licensed to 
perform marriages, or were you not?” 

“Yes.” 

“And you still are. Well, boys, do you see it? 
If the young lady won’t tell her dear friends what 
she knows, she’ll tell her dear husband, me, won’t 
she? And if any of the people (he mentioned what 
he thought of the people) at Residency island cut 
up their capers, why, nobody, not even a blanky 
man-of-war, can get down on a man for running off 
with his own wife, can they? See?” 

They did see, apparently. Their awe of the 
little scoundrel who ruled Wawaka Island, momen- 
tarily suspended, returned. The access of un- 
wonted scruple, awaked by captive Deirdre’s help- 
lessness and beauty, fell away. If the “little tart” 
was to be let go, safe and unharmed, immediately 
she had told, it was all right. If she was to be kept 
on the island as Fursey’s wife, it was all right again. 
He could find ways and means of making her tell. 
And the ceremony would keep the law — so far as 
any existed — at bay. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 265 

One thing no one yet had asked; whether Deirdre 
would consent, or not, to marry the red-haired lit- 
tle villain who stood before them. Child put the 
question; it cannot be supposed he did not know 
the answer, hut he may have wished that someone 
else should know it too. 

“Does a girl always marry a man for the asking?” 

“A girl,” said Fursey, twirling his cat moustaches, 
“a girl may be very glad to have the chance.” He 
spoke loud; if Deirdre, in her palm-leaf shelter, did 
not hear him, it was not his fault. 

She did hear. She crouched suddenly close to 
Kalaka, as if the native woman could, or wouldj 
have helped her. Kalaka drew away, and stared 
at her with burning eyes. She said nothing, but 
Deirdre knew the savage heart was torn with mur- 
derous jealousy, and that nothing save the fear of 
the rock that had been Maiva’s doom protected her 
from Kalaka. 

When the men were gone, and only Child and 
Fursey remained in the big hall, Fursey, giggling, 
came round the corner of Deirdre’s little shelter. 
He looked at her as she sat, half crouching, on the 
ground, and twirled his red moustache more than 
ever. 

“Hn-hnI” he cackled. And again, “Hn-hn!” 

“Got anything to tell me?” he asked presently. 
Deirdre did not speak. She was thinking, rapidly, 
desperately. It seemed to her, so far as she could 
judge in that tense moment, that her wisest course 
lay in saying nothing — in putting Fursey off as 
long as possible. Fursey, for once, had blundered 
in estimating the power of the brain that lived and 
worked behind that pretty face of hers. He had 
supposed, as most men would, that big eyes and lit- 


266 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


tie mouth, wavy hair, soft: cheeks petal-touched 
with pink, spelt silliness, at the least, frivolity. 

But Deirdre’s keen mind had pierced to the heart 
of his design; she had touched, unerringly, the flaw 
in the case as Fursey put it to her. ^ He promised, 
did he, to let her go free, unharmed, if she told him 
where Conn’s mysterious treasure was to be found? 
All very well had she believed him. She did not. 
She felt certain that the capture at the baths had 
been arranged In such a manner as to make every- 
one on the island reasonably certain that she had 
met her death by going out beyond the protecting 
fence. She guessed — and guessed rightly — that 
Fursey had dropped something of hers in deep 
water outside the baths, — her cap — her bathing 
cloak. . . . They would think she was dead. They 
would not be quite certain; they would look for her 
on the chance — ^but they would be easily satisfied; 
would soon conclude that she really had been 
drowned, since everything pointed that way. 

Then — ^what had Fursey to gain by letting her 
go? Nothing. He had, on the contrary, every- 
thing to lose. 

She saw it all. Either he would put an end to 
her — she believed him capable of it — and let her 
vanish from earth’s surface, when he had gained 
the knowledge he desired, or he would marry her 
by means of the renegade missionary’s services (that 
it would be illegal, he could not know) and think 
to defy her friends, keeping her as his wife. He 
would calculate, that once in his power, she would 
not care to face the world again; that she would 
be glad of the bare chance of making herself legally 
“honest,” and that, with time on his side, he could 
find means of forcing her to tell the truth. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 267 


If she told, now, it would probably mean death, 
and would save her from nothing. 

If she refused flatly to tell, Fursey would marry 
her, practically by force, and have it out of her at 
his leisure. 

If she temporized, somehow, he would not ill 
use her; he would not kill her, or oblige her to 
marry him. He would wait — a little — and see 
what way the cat was going to jump. 

All this flashed through her mind as she sat on 
the ground looking up, with heavy frightened eyes, 
from under her loosened hair, and answering not 
at all to Fursey’s questions. 

“Well?” demanded Fursey, with the inevitable 
giggle. 

“Not yet,” was what she managed to bring out, 
through lips curiously unsteady. 

“What, not yet?” giggled Fursey. “You’d bet- 
ter, you know. Much better. Things might hap- 
pen to you that happened to me — down in Meliasi 
street. That’s a score to be settled with your fancy 
man, and you might do the settling.” 

Deirdre caught his meaning, and turned sick, but 
she managed to speak more clearly. 

“I meant — I meant that it wouldn’t be safe. 
If anyone went now to look for the — mine — it 
would be understood what had happened. And 
they’d know I had told. I don’t want them to 
know.” 

Fursey looked at her under red, bunched eye- 
brows. 

“Ah!” he said. “And why not, Deirdre?” 

She was collecting all her forces now. This man 
must be deceived — must be. 

“They would think it was revenge.” 


268 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“Oh — ho — revenge! Now what for, Deirdre?” 
The way of his speaking her name made her hate it. 

In answering, her voice had the ring of truth, 
and she knew it. 

“Mr. Conn and I were engaged, and he has 
thrown me over.” Let Fursey think what he chose. 
He would naturally think she wished to be re- 
venged; that she would tell willingly — by and by. 
He, or his like, could never know that she would 
have defended any secret of Conn’s to the last drop 
of her heart’s blood — to the end of the high rock, 
and the fall, if need be. 

The chief of Wawaka grew grave, which showed 
that he was pleased. 

“Ah I My boat boy told me of a quarrel. . . . 
So he threw you over, Deirdre? More fool he. 
What little games of yours has he been finding out? 
Never mind; they won’t worry me. Off with the 
old love and on with the new.” He cast her a 
languishing glance, which Deirdre forced herself 
to return. “The creature’s vanity must help me,” 
she thought. 

“Yes,” she said. “That was what I was crying 
about. You needn’t have carried me off. I would 
have gone — to pay him out. He’s so very con- 
ceited; he thinks there’s no one like himself. 
Great clumsy fellow.” She sent another glance 
at Fursey. She saw he was half deceived, but only 
half, so far. 

^ “Wait — just a couple of days,” she went on hur- 
riedly. “As soon as ever it’s safe. I’ll show you. 
I couldn’t tell you. Why, you don’t think he could 
have kept a place safe all these years, if it was the 
sort of thing anyone could find by just mention- 
ing it?” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 269 

“You can tell me what it is, anyhow,” observed 
Fursey. He was watching her very narrowly. She 
did not know where she found the strength to laugh 
back at him. 

“Gold,” she said promptly. “Nuggets — chunks. 
In the coral rock. In the caves at — at — I don’t 
know the name of the place, but it’s some miles 
off; I could find it if I were on the shore. I made 
him show me. He gave me some of the gold.” 
She was astonished at her own fluent lying. 

“It don’t sound too likely,” mused Fursey. “Gold 
— in coral. In — ” 

Child, for the first time, broke in. 

“Not unknown,” he said, leaning over the par- 
tition. “The goldfields of Woodlark, in Papua, 
are that kind. They get it where it sank into the 
coral rock. Quite a lot.” Deirdre, unseen, threw 
him a swift glance of gratitude; guessed, in that 
moment — how, she did not know — ■ that Child 
was on her side, and that he did not believe 
her story of the gold, even though he was back- 
ing her up. 

“I — I’ll take you to it as soon as things blow 
over,” she said, fighting hard for her chance. “He’s 
terribly revengeful. I — I don’t know what he*’d do 
if he thought I had given him away. Let me wait 
— ^let me have a day or two.” 

Fursey, musing uglily, with one hairy hand at 
his lip, eyed her in silence. 

“You shall have it,” was his final conclusion. 
Then he bent down, and took his shoes off. They 
were handsome shoes, of fine brown leather, with 
heels too high for a man. Fursey was inordinately 
proud of his little feet. 

“Put them on,” he said. “They won’t be too 


270 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


large. You, Kalaka, get me another pair. Get a 
hat for the white woman.” 

Kalaka, sullenly, did his bidding. Fursey tossed 
the hat to Deirdre. ‘Tut it on,” he said. 

“Where — what — ” she began to ask. 

“You and I and Child,” said Fursey, “are going 
for a little walk in the bush.” 


CHAPTER Xiy 


‘^OlT her down,” said Fursey’s voice. “She can 
^ walk now.” 

The carriers stopped with a jerk. They had 
been labouring hard for the last half hour. In the 
stillness made by their ready halt, one could hear 
their panting breath. 

“Undo the hammock and take the hardkei chief 
out of her mouth,” ordered Fursey. “She can 
screech all she wants to here.” 

Somebody fumbled at the lashings of the long 
bundle. Air and daylight came in. Deirdre’s 
cramped limbs, unable to carry her at first, let her 
down; she sat on the ground, dazed. A white 
man’s hand slipped the handkerchief gag from her 
mouth. She looked up and saw Child’s immense, 
awkward form standing above her, and little Fur- 
sey grinning beside. 

Four pig’s feet were lying on the ground. She 
stared at them, wondering, as well as she could for 
the giddiness and sickness caused by that long jour- 
ney underneath the sun, what they might be for. 
No one took the trouble to explain. It was not 
till afterwards that she knew she had been bundled 
up to represent a pig carried native fashion, 
wrapped in leaves and slung to a pole, and that the 
feet gave the last, convincing touch. Nor did she 
know that Fursey and Child had followed another 
271 


272 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


road, joining her only now, when the sun was al- 
ready westering and the carriers, hard driven by 
fear of their ruthless little chief, had taken her 
many miles into the interior of the great, unknown 
island. 

They were under shade now, upon a narrow 
winding track that began to loop stiffly uphill. There 
were banyan trunks by the wayside, waving dank 
hair of aerial rootlets over the road — if road it 
could be called that was no more than a foot in 
width. 

Pitcher-plants, swaying outwards, shed foul 
odours from their fain-appearing cornucopias of 
shining green. A flower, the colour of raw flesh, 
hung in clusters on a thorny stem; its buds were 
huge, angular and heavy, like gobbets of butchers’ 
meat. The knees and ankles of the banyan trunks, 
where they had been lately cut to clear the path, 
showed red and bleeding. There are spots in the 
fierce Western Pacific — known to those who know 
the islands, and to those only — where Nature, taken 
by some mood of demoniac sport, seems to have 
mimicked in herself the devilish human creatures 
who live on her sufferance. This was such a place 
— had Deirdre been in a mood to see it. 

But she was in no mood to see or think of any- 
thing save her present plight, which she judged to 
be worse than that of yesterday. Yesterday, she 
had been within a mile or two of her friends, though 
without power of communication. It had been, at 
least, possible that they might take the chance of 
her being still alive, might search the island, and 
find her there. Steve — surely Steve would not 
accept her death without a struggle — he — ^who had 
warned her — oh, how justly! — never to leave the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


273 


Residency island unguarded. It mattered little or 
nothing, at this crisis, that they had quarrelled and 
parted; that they were not likely, now, ever to be 
married. Deirdre knew well that the very heat 
and fury of his anger showed the strength of his 
love for her. Steve would not tamely believe that 
she was dead, even though there seemed to be no 
reason for believing otherwise. She could imagine 
him going over to Wawaka at the full speed of his 
best oarsmen, challenging Fursey, hunting the island 
from landing-place to summit, from coral shore to 
shore. . . . 

Ah, but so, no doubt, could Fursey imagine — 
that was why he had taken her off into the bush. 
That was why he had had her carried on a pole like 
a pig, covered up in leaves, so that there should be 
no tale to tell of a white woman borne away into 
the forests — that was his reason for keeping hid, 
though doubtless near, until they had reached this 
lonely spot at the end of the foothills, and the be- 
ginning of the inland ranges. Here was the boun- 
dary between the tribes of the coast and the tribes 
of the hills always at war, after a secret sniping 
fashion — never on speaking terms. . . . The plan 
had been well laid. Sitting there on the ground, 
she saw the mortal danger in which, now, she was 
entangled. The sickness of fear crept over her; 
the lonely track, leading to unknown forest depths, 
to horrors whispered of among the whites, half 
known, seemed like the very track of hell. . . . 

“Hop it,” said Fursey’s voice, muffled by a huge 
cigar. “The boys have had enough; you’ll have 
to walk the hill.” He laid his hand on her arm, as 
if to pull her up. Deirdre shook her benumbed 
limbs into action, and hurriedly rose. She stood, 


274 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

swaying a little, and staring about her. The sun 
was getting low; it came through the leaves a little 
in spurts of angry fire. The heat was frightful; 
Deirdre, the carriers, Child and Fursey, dripped 
from bare arms and foreheads ; hair was like seaweed 
new drawn from the sea. They started. Child 
stalked ahead, and looked at no one; now and then 
he spat blood<oloured saliva on the path, and Deir- 
dre knew, with a sinking of heart, that he had 
drugged himself with betelnut. She followed next; 
behind her walked Kalaka, who had mysteriously 
appeared from nowhere; Fursey and the carriers 
came after. 

“Where are we going? What are they going 
to do?” was the thought that hammered in her 
brain, mingled with a wild, unceasing call for Conn. 
Could he not hear? Was he, who loved her so, 
unconscious of her need, while she called and called? 

She tried hard to send her message. 
“Steve,” she repeated in her mind, as they toiled up 
the rough, ascending track. “Steve! Save me. 
Come!” 

It was a cruel journey. Deirdre was young and 
strong, but she was tired, she had not eaten that 
day, save for a crust that Kalaka, at Fursey’s bid- 
ding, had tossed her, and the jerking and jolting 
of the rude litter had left her stiff in almost every 
muscle. The track wound up and up, with never 
a pause for breath. When she would have stopped, 
Fursey snarled at her. “We’ll never get there be- 
fore night if you don’t hurry up,” he told her, with 
a blast of his characteristic swearing. “And if 
we don’t, the coast tribes will get us and kai-kai us. 
Get on!” 

Child seemed half stupefied with betelnut; his 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 273 

eyes were wide and glaring, his mouth all over 
crimson stain — but he reached a huge hand to Deir- 
dre by and by, and whirled her along up the path at 
his side. And so they went for another two hours, 
until the sun failed altogether, and dusk began to 
rise like a green, drowning tide. They could still 
see the road, thin as a furrow, cutting the dense 
bush, and the strip of shadowy sky above. All 
else was forest, night and fear. 

Suddenly, Kalaka, who had been padding silently 
for hours, called out to Child in native. Child 
nodded, and turned to the right off the track into 
the bush. Directed by the girl, he wound about 
between the stems of nutmeg and wild fig, until, 
more by feeling than sight, he struck another path. 

“Dass right now,” said Kalaka. “ ’Nother road, 
he make for to gammon someone. Suppose no 
savvy, walk along him, you fall down one big, bee-eg 
hole full up along spear. Spear he go along inside 
you belly, den you die.” 

“Fine defences they have,” said Fursey cheer- 
fully. 

Kalaka halted the party a little farther on, and 
called out at the top of her shrill voice what seemed 
to be a password. It was answered from not very 
far away. 

“Go on,” said the girl. “Diss place, s’pose you 
no ’top, sing out, by-’n’-by man belong village s’oot 
him gun along load (road), him kill you dead.” 
She seemed to swell with pride as she spoke. Deirdre 
guessed that this village, to which they were com- 
ing, must be the one from which the girl had been 
bought, to be a slave to Fursey on Wawaka Island. 
Kalaka was evidently enjoying her office of guide.. 

Singing as she went, she led them through the 


276 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

thickening dusk, to a point where something like 
a wall rose up and barred the path. Two shadowy 
shapes, armed with guns, spears, and clinking cart- 
ridge belts, jumped out from nowhere, and laid 
their musket barrels across the way. Kalaka spoke 
to them; so, to their astonishment, did Child, who 
seemed to know the language as well as the girl 
herself. The men, who had been hovering doubt- 
fully from foot to foot, uncertain whether to let 
the strangers pass, let out a united shout. One of 
them seized the white man by his arm, and made, in 
the dusk, a curious motion, which Deirdre could 
just see — pulling his own hand, with a jerk, across 
his mouth. Child did the same. With a yell of 
delighted laughter, the native let him go, and led 
the way into the fortified town. It was a wolf- 
mouth of a gate, just wide enough for one slim 
person to squeeze through, and further protected 
by its extreme lowness, which obliged anyone enter- 
ing the village to bend down almost double. In 
turn. Child, Kalaka, Deirdre, and Fursey entered. 
The natives who had carried her — two only — stood 
trembling at the gate, not daring to go through. 
Roughly, the guardians spoke to Fursey and Kalaka, 
pointing to the native strangers, and shaking their 
woolly heads. Fursey said something In a low tone 
to the nearest; Kalaka, clapping her hands together, 
with an ugly laugh, ran Into the village square which 
was brightly lit by torches and cooking fires. 

“You come,” she said to her charge, dragging 
the white woman by the hand. “You get out of 
the damn road, will you.” (Quoting English of 
Wawaka Island.) 

“What is the matter?” asked Deirdre. 

“Woman get out of de way,” was all Kalaka 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 277 

would say. A remembrance of something heard or 
read about the customs of these fierce and cruel 
people troubled the girl; she could not be sure, but 
she thought that the sudden retirement of women 
meant fighting — murder. What were they going 
to do? 

Kalaka, hiding behind a house, and still holding 
fast to Deirdre’s hand, seemed to listen. There 
was no cry, no struggle. There was, after one 
interminable minute, a crackling 'blow. Another. 
Then nothing more. 

“He pinish,” said Kalaka delightedly. She let 
go Deirdre’s Land, and began to dance, throwing 
her arms above her head, and singing a wild, but 
musical song. There were other women in the 
enclosed square of the fortified village ; like Kalaka 
they danced and sang, flinging up their arms, and 
tossing back their heads. Deirdre -did not dare to 
ask what it was that had just happened. She hardly 
dared to let herself think. The carriers . . . 

who alone could tell where she had been taken . . . 
who would have talked, as natives always did . . . 
to their friends. . . . She knew that if she thought 
about it, she must lose her nerve. And never, in 
all her eight and twenty years, had nerve been more 
sorely needed. “I won’t think,” she told herself, 
biting her trembling lips. “What’s this village ? A 
mountain village in the unexplored part of the 
island, I suppose. What an immense, dusty square 
— and all the little dirty palm houses built round 
it. . . . Those are drums — those enormous things 
in the middle, hollow trees, with horrible faces 
carved. . . . My God, I’m tired — tired. There is 
Fursey coming back.” 

He came, strutting in his high-heeled shoes, and 


278 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

twisting the incredibly long ends of his ginger 
moustache. The firelight and torchlight shone upon 
him, and showed clearly every line in his wide, vil- 
lainous, but clever little face. He was giggling. 
Something — Deirdre feared to think what — had 
given him satisfaction. 

‘‘Come along, you Child,” he called. Child, 
slower, soberer, came shambling after him. Half 
a dozen native bucks, with woolly hair lined into 
black and white stripes, black paint round their 
fierce eyes, red and white paint in patterns upon 
their naked, glistening bodies, followed Child. 
They stared at Deirdre with a kind of horror; she 
was as strange, unnatural to them as a ghost might 
have been to herself. No white woman had ever 
been seen or dreamed of, so far inland, on unknown 
Mellasi. 

“Well — hn-hni” laughed Fursey. ‘'‘Child and 
I have got to be going; we mean to be back on 
Wawaka before morning. In case anyone gets talk- 
ing, and comes over to pay a call. This is Kalaka’s 
town. She’ll stay here till I give her leave to go 
again. She’s been well paid for; they won’t let her 
away — or you. I’m going to show up at home; 
I’ll be back in a few days’ time, and by then you’ll 
have made up your mind to take me to that mine 
of Conn’s. Look here, my lady,” he thrust his 
face close to hers ; Kalaka grinned to see her wince 
back, “I don’t know how much I believe or don’t 
believe of that little yarn of yours. But you can 
believe this. If you don’t tell, you’ll be made to 
and my ways of making people do things aren’t 
nice. If you do tell, you can take me to see the 
place first — when the talk has died out; they’ll all 
think you drowned, you know — anc^then you can 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

either go back to your friends” — she saw his eyes 
blink as he said it, and knew that he was lying — 
“or you can stay on Wawaka, and be the queen of 
the island, with me. You can have four days to 
make up your mind; I shan’t want you before that. 
And you can b^ easy that nobody’ll find you here. 
No one knows this place exists, except Kalaka and 
us; the hill tribes eat the coast tribes on sight, so 
there’s no gossiping goes on, and the whites have 
never been here. I don’t want to be unkind to 
you,” he continued after a pause. “I’m not a devil^ 
you know. I’m just a man who does what he feels 
like doing, and doesn’t let anybody or anything 
come between. You treat me well and I’ll treat 
you well. That’s me, Fursey, and everybody knows 
it. . . . Kalaka, you look out good along this fel- 
low Mary. Suppose you let him go, you go where 
Maiva went. Three-four day I come back.” The 
chief of the village, a man with a face like an iron 
devil, and legs and arms like the trunks of trees, 
had just come up, and was looking at the party 
with the calm incuriousness of true high breeding. 
“Talk to this haw-haw johnnie, will you?” Fursey 
demanded of Child. “Tell him it’s a hundred- 
weight of tobacco and twenty tomahawks to keep 
her safe. Look slippy, we ought to be getting 
back.” 

Child spat the quid of betelnut out of his mouth, 
staining the ground at his feet with crimson. His 
pupils were enormously dilated, the surface of the 
eyes like glass. He spoke monotonously, as if 
he scarcely knew what he was saying. The chief, 
who seemed to regard him as different in some 
occult way from the other whites, drew close to 
him, and listened. At the end he nodded his head 


280 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


with a dislocating jerk, snatched a yam from one 
of his henchmen, handed it to Child, and walked 
off. 

“That’s the guest-gift,” said Child, still staring. 
“He’s agreed.” 

“Hop it, man, hop it, we’ve not any too much 
time,”^ cried Fursey impatiently. “We don’t want 
an exploring expedition to Wawaka, with me away.” 

“I don’t like it,” said Child without stirring. 

“Damn it, what don’t you like? When did you 
get the right to talk about what you like and what 
you don’t, anyway? Don’t you know these people 
will look after the little tart all right till things 
blow over? Don’t you know they wouldn’t touch 
her with a ten-foot pole?” 

“I know it a dashed sight better than you do.” 

“Well, then, what’s the trouble? I’ve stood 
about all from you I’m going to stand.” The tone 
was threatening, and Child, through all the stupor 
of his betelnut drunk, seemed to feel it so. He 
winced visibly. Deirdre watched him in terror. 
Was her one friend going to desert her? 

“I don’t understand — things,” said Child stu- 
pidly. “I forget — and everything muddles itself. 
But I — I — ^want to stay here.” 

“Stay here? What in for?” 

“I — ^you couldn’t get to Wawaka tonight if I’ve 
to come too.” 

“We’ll see about that. You can hurry if you 
like— or if I like.” 

“You’d better let me stay. You know I can’t 
do anything against you. But — suppose the place 
got raided?” 

“It’s not going to be.” 

might,” said Child, who was making a fierce 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 281 


effort to regain his clearness of mind, and evidently 
succeeding. “It would be no good to any of us, 
if she got knocked on the head. You — ^you’d better 
let me stay, Fursey.” 

“ Not to let her escape,” said Fursey, watching 
him narrowly. “You know what would come of 
that.” 

“I know. ... I want to stop in case of trouble. 
These chaps are all right, I suppose, but one would 
like to make sure they’re at peace with their neigh- 
bours.” 

“Well, you can stay till tomorrow, but no longer. 
I want you to show up at Wawaka. You can talk 
to these johnnies here, and make them understand. 
I know you can.” He laughed with what seemed to 
be a secret meaning, and Deirdre, again, saw the 
other man flinch ever so Tittle under the lash of 
Fursey’s words. . . . Why? 

“So long,” said the small rascal, hurrying out 
through the gateway. He had no light with him; 
he had passed the intricate defences of the town but 
once, in the dark. Nevertheless he seemed assured 
of finding his way. The tall chief followed his de- 
parture with moving eyes in an immobile iron face. 
“Mgh !” he grunted approvingly. Then he walked 
over to where Deirdre was standing, uncertain where 
to go or what to do. In the wavering light he 
looked at her, taking her in from head to foot — her 
long, half-knotted hair, her white face and amber 
eyes, the soiled print dress that hid her slim body, 
save for hands and feet. These, too, he looked 
at, attentively, an expression of profound disgust 
struggling with his chief-like immobility of coun- 
tenance. 


282 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


“Wrrgh I” was his one remark. He spat violently 
on the ground. 

“He no like,” gurgled Kalaka delightedly. “Him 
tink you one oogly woman.” She burst into a 
pleased titter. It was wine to her woman’s vanity. 

Deirdre was conscious of a deep thankfulness. 
This was not at all like the tales in books, where the 
savage chieftain always complicated things by fall- 
ing in love with the beautiful white woman. One 
difficulty, one danger, the less, was to be feared. 
She had heard that dark men do not naturally ad- 
mire white women; that it takes the coming of civili- 
zation to create difficulties of this kind, between race 
and race. But she had not — quite — believed it. 
Her vanity of sex forbade. Now she saw that it 
was true — she saw herself an object of scorn and 
dislike to men — for the first time in her life — and 
she could have sung hymns of joy. 

Child, once Fursey was gone, had relapsed into 
his betelnut dream, and was seated on the ground, 
chewing and spitting red streams. She felt an in- 
finite disgust for the white man — the man of her 
own class — sunk so low; she was beginning to fear 
that he had sunk even beyond what she had guessed. 
Yet it was well to have him there. Anything of 
one’s own colour I . . . 

Reaction — the force that snatches us back from 
disintegration and death, a million times in a life, 
failing us but once, and that once the last time of 
all — ^was beginning to lift her spirits again. She 
would get out of this — somehow. Who would have 
thought she could have come, safe and unharmed, 
through the terrors of these last twenty-four hours? 
Yet here she was, tired and dirty and hungry, but 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 283 

in no way the worse. She would win through — she 
would I 

Food was brought out by and by. Deirdre eyed 
it with uneasy apprehension at first; she knew she 
must be among the cannibal towns, and there was 
no knowing what might not be served up at the 
communal meal now beginning to be spread on the 
ground. But she saw nothing worse than pig, 
wrapped in green leaves, baked bananas, yams, ar- 
rowroot boiled and tied up in tiny puddings. The 
men squatted down first, and ate, not greedily, but 
slowly, and with what might have been called very 
fair table manners. When they had done, the 
women, squatting patiently outside the ranks of 
diners, followed them, and squabbled over the re- 
mains. 

Child, suddenly waking up, called in a voice of 
thunder to Kalaka. What he said, Deirdre did 
not know, but it took effect. The savage girl 
brought food to both ; hot yams and sweet potatoes, 
served on plaited mats protected by green leaves. 
She recompensed herself for the service by making 
a face at Child, and treading, as she left, on 
Deirdre’s foot. 

There was water in a tall bamboo, leaning against 
one of the houses. Child tipped it, and handed it 
to the girl. He drank after her. Then he said, 
wiping his mouth on what remained of a torn 
sleeve — 

“I was a gentleman — once.” 

“What happened?” asked Deirdre. They were 
sitting side by side, upon a log used by the women 
for beating out tappa cloth. A dance was getting 
up among the natives. Oiled till each muscle stood 


284 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


out in high lights, painted black, white and red, deco- 
rated with red flowers set in their hair, and with 
green and white grasses tucked into the arm and 
leg bands that were their only clothing, the men of 
the nameless village were beginning their nightly 
amusement. It seemed, tonight, to be a special occa- 
sion; more and more food was being carried in 
through the narrow trap gateway, and piled in heaps 
before the drum trees, women had drawn themselves 
up into a long row, and holding wands in their hands, 
shuffled and hummed incessantly. By and by some- 
one began to beat the drum trees, and, in an in- 
stant, the whole town rang with a horrible, dull 
fierce clamour, the very essence of savagery. The 
trees were ten to fifteen feet in height, hollowed 
inside, and carved at the top into frightful grinning 
faces, with long tongues that wagged and waved 
under the thundering of the beater’s stick. 

Child’s answer could scarcely be heard amidst 
the uproar. 

“Many things,” Deirdre thought him to say. 
“The last — ended. Betelnut — ^betelnut — it’s death, 
moral death to a white man. You’ll do anything.” 

Somehow, she was not afraid of him. Her 
woman’s instinct told her that the soul of the man 
still lived. Did Fursey’s live? Had he ever had 
a soul? . . . 

“You can get back,” she persisted. “There’s 
always a way.” 

“Is there?” said Child, turning his blue eyes, 
glassy with the drug, upon her. “What way?” 

Deirdre considered. Things in books rushed back 
to her — half recollected — ^vague. “If you could do 
some good thing — some great good thing,” she 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 285 

found at last. “It would be a kind of stairway. I 
don t speak well — that noise makes my mind go 
round and round.” 

It was increasing every minute; many more had 
taken a hand, and the whole grove of drums was 
in action, booming like an angry sea. “It’s meant 
to be hypnotizing — that, and the women’s waving 
and shuffling about,” she thought in a parenthesis. 
“They’ve always known about those things.” 

Child was not looking at the drummers; the whole 
wild scene had too long been known to him. “You 
think I could wipe things out?” he said at last. 

“Oh, don’t take me literally — what does one 
know? I’m only quoting what somebody has said 
somewhere.” 

The big man was silent for a while. “Too late,” 
he said by and by. “You don’t know everything. 
God forbid. . . .” He stopped. 

The dance was working up. Round and round 
the central group of drum trees fled the men dancers, 
heads down and arms out, sailing over the ground 
like birds of prey. Deirdre, half drugged by the 
thunderous sound of the drumming, and the endless, 
monotonous shuffle of the women’s dance, watched 
as one w^atches in a heavy stifling dream. She saw, 
in this dream, the iron-faced chief, old man though 
he was, leading the dance with the lightness of a 
youth, performing wonders of muscular activity, 
without the slightest change of his set, inhuman 
countenance. She saw the others, > following him 
and imitating, as she now understood, the hover and 
pounce of a bird of pfey, chasinjg its victim. She 
traced, scarce knowing that she did so, the resem- 
blance running throygh all the dance to the sinister. 


286 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


black things, half bat, half bird, that made the 
avenue of idols hideous, down on the far-away 
coast. . . . The dance grew hotter; they had taken 
up their guns, and were dancing madly and more 
madly, round the drum trees, cocked and loaded 
weapons on their shoulders. All the noise that had 
gone before was as nothing to the thunder-drum- 
ming that now began, shot through with the women’s 
long, howling screams. A blind man, an idiot, could 
not but have known that something was coming — 
something going to happen. . . . 

Through the trap gateway, bending low, and then 
staggering to full height under the load of the bur- 
dens that they bore, came four men, two and two. 
Between them, each couple carried what seemed to 
be a heavy weight — something long, wrapped up in 
cerements of green leaves, and tied to a pole. 

The girl heard Child say something to himself — 
a short, sharp word. He was on his feet. He had 
taken her hand. 

“Come out of this,” he said, leading her to the 
nearest building — a low-roofed, long thatch house, 
surrounded by a fence of bamboo. “There’s no one 
here — come inside.” They were almost running, 
Child pulling her along. He kept her with her back 
to the dance. A lame old man crept forward, and 
made threatening sounds; it seemed he did not want 
them to go in; he shook his feeble arm. Child 
looked full at him, and then drew his own hand, 
sharply, across his mouth at the distance of an inch 
or two, as he had done in the presence of the men 
who guarded the gateway. The old man laughed, 
surprised. He turned away, and left them to 
themselves. 

“Come in,” said Child hoarsely, through the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 287 

furious thunder of the drums. *‘You can’t see — I 
mean, it’s quiet in here.” He pulled her through 
the doorway, which was a “canoe” doorway of 
ancient pattern, narrow and very high. Inside, there 
was solitude, and when the door was shut, a certain 
measure of peace. 

Child struck a match, and, feeling for a candlenut 
torch — he seemed to know just where everything was 
to be found — lighted it. Beneath the smoky flare, 
Deirdre looked about her. The place appeared to 
be a sort of mausoleum. Skulls, some new, some 
sienna brown with age, were set in rows like jampots, 
on high shelves; arm and leg bones were stacked 
in sets and laid away on the rafters. There were 
heavy carved mauls, at whose use she shudderingly 
guessed; drumsticks, painted and cut in patterns; 
adzes, with ugly human faces glaring from the 
handles. At the far end of the building, as Child 
raised aloft his torch, she could see things stranger 
yet — a staring array of skeletons, roughly fashioned 
into mummies by means of paint and stuffing; and 
at the very end of all . . . what was it? 

Silently Child moved nearer, and held up the 
light. And Deirdre saw — without guessing how 
very nearly the strange thing was to touch her and 
her future, but yet with considerable awe — a seated 
silent figure of a man. At first she thought he was 
alive, immobile though he was. Then she saw that 
he was dead — dead, and stuffed. Not roughly as 
the padded skeletons had been fashioned; they, his 
waiting court, were but bone and painted fibre. The 
seated corpse was stuffed, as a bird or animal is 
stuffed — skin treated with some preservative chemi- 
cal, painted red, and filled with wadding; bones 
carefully inserted in the right place; limbs disposed 


288 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


as in life, wrapped up, amulet hung upon his breast. 
The face was a mask of painted clay, moulded over 
the skull into some attempt at a likeness. The hair 
was a fibre wig. The eyes of the man were cleverly 
represented by two of the green, white and blue 
“cat’s-eye” gems that are found in shells upon island 
coral reefs. In the limp, glove-like fingers of one 
hand he held a club. A band of shells in his hair 
seemed to represent a crown. 

So, seated dead amidst his court of dead men, the 
savage king kept state. 

Almost forgetting how she had come to this place 
— how small was her chance of leaving it alive — 
Deirdre stared in wonder. 

“Have you ever seen anything like that?” she 
asked Child. 

“Hardly ever,” he answered in his monotonous 
voice. “It’s only their big kings they do up in that 
fashion. It’s something to have seen it. They kill 
anyone who dares to look into these temples of 
theirs, as a rule.” 

“But how could you — ” began the girl. 

Child looked at her strangely. 

“They would never kill me,” was all he said. For 
some uncomprehended cause, Deirdre felt she could 
not dwell on the point; she hurried to another. 

“What are they doing outside?” 

“Nothing.” 

“That’s nonsense. If it is nothing, I shall go out.” 

Child reached forward — he seemed to be able 
to stretch over half the house, and took her arm 
in a firm grasp. “You can’t,” he said. 

“They’re not fighting,” argued Deirdre. “They’re 
only having another feast. I can smell — ” the 
words died on her lips. Suddenly, instantly, she 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 289 

knew what it was they were cooking; where the 
bodies of the carriers had gone. . . . 

She said no more about leaving the temple shelter. 

They stayed for an hour or two. Kalaka came 
once or twice and looked in, saying something to 
Child. He answered her dully and briefly, and she 
went away again. 

Deirdre, seated for very weariness on the ground, 
beaten into a passive, hypnotic state, by the endless 
bellowing of the drums, and almost half asleep, was 
waked, at last, to full attention, by an unexpected 
happening outside. The cannibals, ending their 
meal, began to sing. At the same time the drums, 
abruptly, ceased their thunder, and there was peace. 

So great was the relief, at first, that she hardly 
noticed what the singing was like ; it was enough that 
that crazing thunder had stopped at last. But in 
a minute the melody began to catch her ears — the 
keen ears of a composer. 

“Why, it’s good — listen !” she exclaimed. Child, 
with an air of untellable weariness, was leaning his 
huge slack body up against the walls of the death- 
temple, staring emptily at the roof. 

“I don’t know anything about those things,” he 
said. “I never knew one tune from another, even 
when I was . . .” He stopped. 

Deirdre, roused to interest, took no notice of 
him. “Listen,” she said, again. “Why it’s hardly 
savage music at all — hear that modulation. These 
people can sing!” 

“Cannibals,” observed Child, in answer to the 
tone of amazement in her voice, “are generally more 
intelligent than the other kind. Victors — survival 
of what-is-it? I used to know all about that, 
when . . .” The sentence trailed off again. 


290 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


During nearly an hour, the wild concer't continued, 
one man singing a solo now and then, to be taken 
up at intervals by full-throated chorus. The tunes 
were monotonous, brief in range, and there seemed 
to be few of them, for after the first half hour the 
singers did nothing but repeat. Still, the character 
of the music was very far from poor, and it went 
with a splendid swing. The conclusion was irre- 
sistible, that these cannibal brutes could, and would, 
handle better music, if they had the opportunity. 

“They told me something about this at the Mis- 
sion,” breathed Deirdre. “The converts used to 
sing wonderfully; just give them an air, and they 
simply ate it up. But I did not know these people — ” 

“Same people,” said Child sleepily. “I heard the 
chief — fellow with the tin face on him — once brained 
a chap from another village for stealing one of their 
songs. Eat him too. Made sure.” 

The singing had stopped. The village seemed 
settling down to rest. Kalaka, looking as usual, 
handsome, fierce and sulky, came to the door, dressed 
in a fringe of grass, and beckoned to Deirdre to 
come out. 

“Woman no stop along diss house,” she said. 
“You come woman house wit’ me. You sleep along 
me, no lun away.” 

The women’s house, where the unmarried girls 
slept under guard — a sentry with a gun watching 
the door, lest neighbouring tribes should break in 
and steal — ^was not far from the temple. Child gave 
Deirdre to understand that he would sleep at the 
door of the temple himself. “If you want me, you 
can call me,” he said. 

She thanked him, and went. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 291 

All that night — it was not a long one, for the 
feast and the concert had run on till nearly dawn — 
Deirdre lay, unwillingly, close to the fierce Kalaka, 
held even in sleep by the native girl’s strong arm. 
She herself slept little. This was a worse night 
than the last, bad though that had been. What 
might the next one bring? . . . Oh, the little, white 
safe room in the Residency, with the night light and 
the frog, and Mrs. Carbery’s snoring on one side, 
and Blackbury’s heavy weight creaking his chain 
stretcher at the other! Oh, what one would give 
to be there — to wake from this horrible dream! 

But the only dream she woke from was the 
troubled, tossed vision that assailed her, close to 
dawn, in which she found herself slipping — slipping 
— down a long black slope that ended in a blank 
nothingness, while Fursey and the chief with the 
iron-devil face stood capering at the top. . . . 

With morning, hope revived, as hope often does. 
Conn would discover her. Blackbury would bring 
a body of police up, and raid the town. The man- 
of-war would come in, and the captain would find 
out what had happened, and rescue her, and take 
everyone, more or less, off to trial and jail, in 
Fiji. She managed to feel quite cheerful for a little 
while. 

Then, the sight of Child sitting like a native on 
the ground at the door of the temple, chewing his 
eternal betelnut, struck her with a sense of chilling 
weakness and dismay. That! — all she had to de- 
pend on ! That thing, which had once been white, 
a gentleman, a man — and was now — she feared to 

think what. ... n, , , 

There was no use hoping that Conn or Blackbury 


5292 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


would guess. How could they? If she had found 
Conn’s clothes lying beside the swimming bath, and 
Conn nowhere to be seen, would she not have con- 
cluded that he had been drowned in those tempting 
dangerous waters beyond the guardian fence? If 
she had not been certain — if she had perhaps induced 
Blackbury to question natives, hunt all over Wa- 
waka, what would the result have been? Nothing 
at all. No one would have seen any white person 
being taken to Wawaka Island. No one would have 
found anything amiss on the Island Itself. Friends 
on Mellasi would have waited, wondered a little, 
grieved a great deal, and then given the missing one 
up for lost. Would not they? Had not they? She 
was sure they had. 

And yet — 

Yet — if it were she who sought — if the missing 
one were Conn — she would never have quite believed 
him dead, until she had seen his body lying at her 
feet. 

Some of the men were going out of the village. 
She watched them with a certain dull interest. Al- 
ready the heaviness of the captive mind began to 
be hers. Trifles obsessed her; she stared and gaped, 
conscious all the while of deep underlying terror that 
she dared not think about. The men were loaded 
with goods — fruit from their gardens; sweet pota- 
toes, yams. Women, not men, carried the loads as 
a rule. She wondered. 

Kalaka, squatting near, and smoking a bamboo 
pipe, took it out of her mouth long enough to re- 
mark in a superior manner — . 

“Him go makiti.” 

“Makiti?” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


293 


“Makiti — one man him sellem somet’ing, ’nother 
man him buy. Salt-water man havem salt, shell. 
Man-bush havem yam, fotato.” 

“Market — where?” It seemed odd to her that 
the coast and the hill tribes, so patently afraid of 
one another, should venture to meet on a mere com- 
mercial pretext. 

Kalaka, who seemed in a better temper to-day, 
condescended to explain. The hill men and the salt- 
water men, it seemed, never met unless to kill. But 
each had goods that the other required. Therefore 
they arranged to travel to a point midway, where 
the hill tribes, arriving first, laid down their goods 
on a stone, and then, retiring Into the forest, called 
out In loud song to let the salt-water men know they 
were honestly going back. Still singing, they retired 
till they could be no longer heard. At this point of 
the negotiations the coastal men came up, singing 
also, examined the goods, left an equivalent, and 
retired — still singing. The hill men came down, 
left signs to show approval or disapproval, and went 
back repeating the previous performance of song. 
This might go on all day if the parties were not 
satisfied, and the bargaining was keen; It might go 
on into the next day — or it might end at the first 
stage, after only one or two bouts of “setting to 
partners.” All the time, neither party of traders 
was ever within a mile of the other. If either party 
stopped singing, it was the signal for a charge and 
a fight, to anticipate the treachery suggested by 
silence. 

Thus Kalaka. Dcirdre listened with dull Interest, 
until suddenly, a stray word from Kalaka stung her 
into life. 


294 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

“Very good my countryman he sing, more better 
dan salt-water man. Very good sing him havem. 
One time, salt-water man him stealem my country- 
man sing, my countryman cut him liver out. One 
time, him too good sing my countryman, den dat 
Chief Conn him take him sing, dat Chief Conn him 
singem all-a-same, along fiano.” 

Deirdre judged this to mean that, Conn 
enamoured of some of the mountain people’s airs, 
had taken down one or two, and sung them at his 
own piano. 

Kalaka went on to say that her countrymen, being 
in awe of the Chief Conn, had omitted to cut out 
his liver according to etiquette, but that they had 
asked him to send payment of “tobacco,” and that 
he had done so. It seemed he came to the monthly 
market himself as often as not, away down near 
the shore, and that he often amused himself singing 
their songs. 

Did he wait for the mountain party to come down, 
after the shore party had retired? Deirdre asked, 
with throbbing heart. She knew the natives’ in- 
curable propensity for gossip. She thought it im- 
possible Conn should not hear something from them. 

Kalaka dashed her hopes instantly. No, the 
mountain men did not wait. They were too much 
afraid of Conn. He was a friend of the King 
(Blackbury) and he might tell the King things they 
had done that would make him angry. The King 
was always getting angry about nothing at all. Once 
he had told the man-of-war about the white trader 
the mountain men had taken away and eaten, and 
the man-of-war had shot big guns into the bush, and 
destroyed their villages. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 295 

Fursey would have known, reflected Deirdre dully. 
Of course he must have known — that there was no 
danger in this monthly market business, conducted at 
gunshot length, or he would never have brought 
her up here to hide her away. There was no hope 
there. 

Unless. . . . 

She sat straight up on the ground, charged with 
a new idea. 

What if she got these men to carry her message 
for her? 

She put her hand to her head, and tossed back 
the heavy hair. She wanted to think. 

Only a few of the men had gone. The rest were 
sitting and loafing about the village. By Kalaka’s 
account, they would not leave till afternoon. It 
was considered best for the marketers to go in two 
different parties, as an added precaution against 
treachery. 

Deirdre looked at them, and her plan sprang 
full-grown in her brain. 

“This man he no sing good,” she said scornfully, 
to Kalaka. 

The girl blazed at once. 

“Him sing damn good. Him sing all-a-same 
pigeon long bush.” (Pigeon being the native word 
for any variety of winged fowl.) 

“Him no savvy my sing,” went on Deirdre, 
watching closely. 

“Mgh!” grunted Kalaka, uneasy and contemp- 
tuous. 

Deirdre smiled a small fine smile. She knew — 
none better — that her songs, for all that they were 
in no sense “classical” — perhaps because of that — 
were peerless in their appeal to the popular mind. 


296 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


She had just had evidence of the musical tastes and 
tendencies owned by these extraordinary cannibals. 

“I believe they would,’’ she breathed. “I believe 
I’ll try.” 

She put back her head, opened her lips, and sent 
out the gay clear notes of the song that, beyond 
all others, had made her popular and famous — 
“Gypsy Lover.” She sang it through from begin- 
ning to end; it was short, like most of her songs, 
but it carried much In a small compass, and the 
melody was irresistible. When she came to the 
last verse, she sang it twice over. 

“Ftar away, far away, where the hills are calling. 

To the open roadway, to the roof of heaven's blue. 

To the last long camp of all, where life’s last dusk is 
falling, 

Gypsy lover, gypsy lover. I’ll go with you!” 

Into her mind as she sang came, stabbingly, 
the memory of the day when she last had sung that 
song — could It be such a little while ago? The sun 
among the mango trees, sinking low; white path- 
ways, red flowers lying In drifted heaps; herself 
among the flowers, singing to her lover. . . . 

Here, full sun was blazing on the dusty square 
of the village; dark, sinister creatures were squat- 
ting in ugly nakedness; there was a feeling, almost 
a smell, of blood in the air; danger, sickening, over- 
powering, hovered llke^ a cloud, or like one of the 
nightmare birds in the idol lane of Mellasi. 

And she was singing— she was singing to these 
cannibal creatures — singing of happy love among 
the blue hills and long cool roads of England, she, 
loveless, and like to die, here in the terrible New 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 297 

Cumberlands, whither she never, never should have 
come. 

She was startled from her mood of bitter mem- 
ory by a strange — an incredible sound. Two or 
three of the young men were picking up her air, 
with every symptom of delight, repeating phrase 
after phrase, singing it to nothing at all, to native 
words improvised on the spur of the moment, to 
the rhythmic beats of a little, musical-sounding 
hand drum, that someone had fetched from a 
house. 

They had caught her song! 

There it went — *^Far away^ far away . . roof 

of heaven! s blue. . . Heaven alone — or the 
other place — knew what words they might be put- 
ting to it. But they were singing it, and with gusto. 
They jumped up and sang it standing, dancing. 
They beat the measure with their hands. They 
had got it right — ^you could hardly miss the tune 
of “Gypsy Lover” if you knew one tune from 
another — they were singing it better and better 
every minute. The whole village joined in, and as 
it had rung on the night before, to the sound of 
the native melodies, so it rang this morning to the 
notes of Deirdre’s merry gypsy tune, sung by lips on 
which the blood of human victims was not yet dry. 

“Him takit makiti!” cried Kalaka;, foreseeing 
credit and triumph for her town. “Him takit mak- 
iti, him sing it for de damn salt-water man.” 

For the rest of that day, Dierdre had reason, 
if ever she had had in her life, to tire, to become 
sick, of her own music. 

She was glad when, the sun being high, and the 
first party long away, it was thought good for the 
second party to leave. After they had gone, the 


298 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

village settled down to quiet. Child was asleep — 
he had not yet started as Fursey had ordered him 
to do. In fact, he did not seerp to have any inten- 
tion of leaving the place. Most of the women had 
gone to work in the gardens; nearly all the men 
were away to market. Some few old men, and 
the guard that never left the gateway, were left. 
Kalaka, too, remained, and kept a watchful eye i 
on Deirdre. But the captive girl had no in- 
tention of attempting an escape. She had seen 
from the first that in this stockaded village, with 
its one guarded gate, escape could not be 
thought of. 

What then? If Conn, by some miraculous 
chance, found out where she was, before it was too 
late, and brought a body of armed white men, to 
rescue her, could she be rescued? She doubted even 
that. In a village where every man had a gun, and 
used it without hesitation — where the place must 
be taken by storm, if at all, and not in any case with- 
out fierce fighting — her chance of surviving a furi- 
ous fire between attackers and defenders would be 
very small. Fursey, of course, had known all that, 
had calculated on it, with his own devilish cunning. 
Child was her friend, in so far as he could be an}^ 
use, but she feared that that was not far. 

Seated on the ground, in the shade of one of 
the squat thatched houses, she mused, and her 
thoughts were not happy ones. She looked up 
at last, to see the immense figure of Child sham- 
bling towards her across the open square. He 
seemed to have given up his drug for the present. 
His mouth was no longer stained dark red, his 
eyes had lost their glassy look. The effects of the ; 
betelnut, however — so much worse with a white •] 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 299 


man than with a black — still showed in the intense 
weariness of his white face, the dullness of his 
expression. He looked like one who had been dead, 
and who was scarce yet recalled to life. 

“I wanted to say to you,” he spoke heavily, 
“that you needn’t be too much afraid. There may 
be a way.” 

“What way?” asked the girl, looking up at him. 
She did not put overmuch faith in any promise of 
Child’s. 

“I can’t tell you that. But if anyone finds out 
you’re here — ” 

“Why can’t you go and tell them?” interrupted 
Deirdre, somewhat sharply. She found it hard to 
have patience with this wreck. 

“I could do that,” answered the big man, “but 
if I did, it would come to the same in the end, and 
you wouldn’t be helped.” 

“I don’t understand you a single bit.” 

“Don’t you see, if you’re in the middle of a fight 
between the cannibals and the whites, you are pretty 
dead sure to have your head blown off.” 

“Yes, I see — ^but what do you mean by its coming 
to the same in the end?” 

“I mean this. There is something I might do — 
to set you free of the village. But it can only be 
done if I’m here and stay here. To get you out is 
the thing.” 

“Well, if there is something you can do, why 
haven’t you done it?” asked Dreirdre, trying hard 
to have patience. 

Child looked at her strangely. 

“I’ll do it, don’t you fear,” he said. “Do you 
know the poems of Adam Lindsay Gordon?” 

“What one in particular?” asked Deirdre, won- 


300 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


dering if the drug had driven him mad. She did 
know Gordon, of course — all sea-gypsies do. 

“The one about the girl who died — 

“ ‘I said in my heart, when his shadow crossed. 

“Oh yes, I remember part of it. It goes on, 
doesn’t it — 

“ ‘What does it matter for one soul lost, 

Millions of isouls have been lost before.^ ” 

Is that it?” 

“Yes,” said Child, turning away from her. 
“That’s it.” 

She did not see his face, as he went back, with- 
out another word, to his shelter in the doorway of 
the temple. The day declined; blue shadows crept 
across the burning dust of the square; the women 
came back from their gardens; smoke of cooking 
fires began to rise. Still Child sat there, unmoving, 
looking down. 


CHAPTER XV 


T he strong south-east was booming about the 
Residency verandahs. The Commissioner, the 
[ French Commissioner, Conn and Mrs. Carbery had 
! found a sheltered spot on the verandah that looked 
northward, and, under the light of Blackbury’s great 
swinging lamp, were talking, slowly, with long gaps 
between their sentences. 

They were all depressed and tired. It was three 
days now since Deirdre’s disappearance. Only the 
I faintest hope had existed that she might not have 
been drowned. Blackbury had little. Conn not much, 
and Mrs. Carbery, supported by the persistent com- 
ing up of “Coffin cards,” had been sure from the first 
that the “lady gurl” was at the bottom of the har- 
bour. “She would be always blandandherin’ me to 
leave her go outside,” explained Deirdre’s chaperon, 
“and for all I would be tellin’ her that sharks and 
all manner was in it, she would be girnin’ to go. 
Sure, when she went down her lone, it would be to 
go over the fince, and over it she will have wint, 
God rest her soul.” 

Blackbury, dealing cards with a slower hand than 
usual to Des Roseaux (the two had taken up their 
ancient game of ecarte of late; it seemed that no 
one had heart for the new game of bridge) was 
of opinion, when asked, that Deirdre had taken 
cramp. The sudden change from the hot swimming 
301 


302 COMSr OF THE CORAL SEAS 

bath to the cold waters outside might have brought 
it on. A shark would have been seen by someone ; 
he understood that there had been a canoe with a 
native in it not very far outside. •. . . 

He had had the question of the canoe looked up, 
conscientiously, but without expecting to hear any- 
thing of moment. The native who had been in it 
was not forthcoming, and no one could or would 
tell anything about him. This, Blackbury thought 
natural enough. The New Cumberlanders were, 
shy of the Residency; and no doubt the paddler of 
the canoe had heard of the white girl’s death, and 
feared he might be blamed for it. 

Des Roseaux alone had doubts. Des Roseaux 
would not let the matter alone. When Conn, half 
mad by now with remorse and grief, swore at him 
roundly, and told him to hold his silly cackle, the 
Frenchman still persisted. How did they know 
she was not still alive? How did they know Fur- 
sey was not at the bottom of this? 

“Damn it, man, didn’t we comb the whole of 
Wawaka from the house to the beach, and back 
again? demanded Conn, looking up, fierce-eyed, 
from the heavy fit of musing into which he had fal- 
len. “Didn’t we see Fursey and his crew? Was 
there a sign of her there?” 

“Me, I find that this Fursey has been too explan- 
atory,” persisted Des Roseaux. “He has explained 
so many things that we don’t ask. We not desire to 
know what he’s been doing all the week and yester- 
day. We not desire to know he has been lying sick 
in the house the morning she has disappeared.” 

“If I had my way, he would be a jolly sight 
sicker,” commented Conn. “You wouldn’t let me 
have it out of him.” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 303 

“My dear chap,” remonstrated Blackbury, look- 
ing up from his cards, “you must try and remember 
some of us are here to make an attempt towards 
creating order. I’ve had to pull you up once for 
behaving like a Red Indian.” 

Conn did not seem to hear him. “If I had a 
grain of hope that he knew anything,” he went on, 
“but I don’t see just where his interest would have 
been in playing any of his tricks. I certainly did, 
think he might follow her and annoy her, if he 
found her away from the island without escort, 
so I advised her not to go cruising about alone any- 
where. But carrying her off — after what I gave 
him for his conduct at my house, it isn’t likely.” 

“Fursey has carried off one lady, isn’t it?” asked 
the French Commissioner, regarding his hand of 
cards with a somewhat absent air. 

“Yes — more or less; of course she went sailing 
in his boat, and allowing him to play the fool. This 
is another matter. Bad as he is, I don’t judge he 
would dare to do it, just for a freak.” 

“Just for a freak — no. But, my old man, caij 
vou think of any other reason, not perhaps a 
freak?” 

“What d’ye mean?” snapped Conn, turning 
round sharply. 

“You were engaged to this lady, isn’t it?” 

“I— yes.” 

“Perfectly. Without doubt you loved her. When 
a man is engaged to a woman, a woman which he 
loves — ^because, my old man, we don’t always love 
that woman which we marry — ^well, then, does he 
not tell her all ? Even that which he ought not per- 
haps to tell? Blackbury, old rascal, have you not 
told your lady so'me things which — ” 


304 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

“We all do,” agreed Blackbury, cutting him short. 
“More fools we. You play, Des Roseaux.” 

Des Roseaux, selecting his card with as much 
nice care as if his life depended on the choice, laid 
it, slowly, down on the table. Immediately after- 
Vi^ards he detached himself from ecarte, in gross and 
in detail, and turned to Conn, shaking a long fore- 
finger emphatically at the younger man. 

“Oh, my Conn, tell the truth — have you not told 
the little Mademoiselle Deirdre where is your 
treasure, and what?” 

“If I did?” parried Conn. 

“Head of a Britannic pig, my friend, can you not 
see what comes after?” 

“He could not know,” said Conn, springing to 
his feet. “How was he to — My God, if he has. 
I’ll kill him, as sure as my name’s — ” 

“You won’t, whether he has or not,” cut in 
Blackbury. He, too, had relinquished his cards, 
and turned round in his chair to look at Conn. 
They were all looking at Conn now. The young 
man’s face had turned the curious lemon-white that 
sunburned faces turn, in moments of strong feeling. 
His eyes were mere dots of fire under their drawn- 
down brows; his mouth was open and trembling 
with rage. He tried to speak, half choked, and 
tried again. 

“I’ll kill him,” he repeated, as if he had not heard 
Blackbury. “Des Roseaux, by God, I think you’re 
right. I have been a fool. The loss of her seemed 
to beat me down so that I could not think. But where 
is she — where is she?” He laid a powerful hand 
on the slight shoulder of Des Roseaux, and shook 
him, in his excitement. 

“Finish then, you are shooking my bones ! Where 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 305 

is she? Do I know. But if I’m right, my old man, 
I would, myself, go walk the country, and see if I 
shall not hear something.” 

“There’s a market tomorrow,” mused Conn. 
“Bush tribes come down to leave goods, shore tribes 
come up and leave price — you know it.” 

“Without doubt; it is my business to know these 
things.” 

“All the coast johnnies will be there. If he has 
had her spirited away to some other island, one 
might — thank you, Des Roseaux, thank you. You’ve 
given me new life.” He was on his feet, taking 
down his helmet from the nail where it had hung 
all the afternoon. 

“You will go home?” 

“Yes — ^yes, I must get ready to be off at daylight.” 
He had hardly a word now; his face was set 
with some firm purpose, that needed no expres- 
sion in speech. The yellow-white tinge had left 
him. 

Blackbury, stacking his cards together to put them 
away, remarked, without looking up — 

“No Red Indian business. Conn. But ask me for 
anything you want — ^boys, boats, what you like. 
Myself, if needed.” 

“Yes,” agreed Conn briefly. A word of good- 
bye to Mrs. Carbery, and he was gone. 

“Last night,” remarked the lady sepulchrally, 
“I dhrew it down with the cards that there was 
coffins, and inimies; and the inimies did be in it like 
fleas in a blanket. It be to be. I’m thinking, that 
the inimies was for him, and the coffin was for her, 
rest her soul.” She took out a large, clean trade 
pocket handkerchief surrounded with alphabets in 


3o6 conn of THE CORAL SEAS 

red and blue, placed it before her eyes, and left 
the verandah. 

Blackbury, sighing heavily, looked' at Des 
Roseaux. 

“Rosy,” he said, using the familiar name that for 
the sake of Commissioner dignity, he never pro- 
nounced before others, “Rosy — do you actually 
think there may be anything in this?” 

“I don’t to know very well what I think,” con- 
fessed Des Roseaux, “but all what I have said is 
quite possible. And if something had not happen 
to take Mr. Conn out of himself, why, my friend, 
there are too many firearms in this country, for to 
be safe to a young man, much disappointed in love.” 

“Now I had rather thought,” mused Blackbury, 
“that they had quarrelled.” 

“But naturally! They are lovers; it is the trade 
of lovers, to quarrel. All the more was it bad he 
should have no thing to take him from himself, with 
this, that ate into him. Say, Blackbury, once you 
have quarrelled with the lady for which you remain 
bachelor?” 

John Bull, leaning on one hand, and holding on, 
as it were, to his own curly, grizzling locks, shook 
his wise head ever so little. “It was the other thing. 
Rosy,” he said. “There are only two.” 

“Not quarrel, therefore not woman — it was then 
money?” 

“Put it want of money. Rosy, and you come near 
the mark. Lack of all money, and you hit the 
mark. Beggars, Rosy, can’t be choosers, especially 
of titled ladies.” 

“She has been noble?” 

“Aye,” said John Bull. “Noble. And a noble- 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 307 

woman, too. She is the Marchioness of Kirkpat- 
rick.” 

“But — Blackbury — the Marquis of Kirkpatrick 
has died!” 

“Six months ago,” agreed John Bull calmly, put- 
ting away his cards. 

“And you — ?” 

“And I — Tm British Commissioner of the New 
Cumberlands. Goodnight, Des Roseaux. And — 
look! Be sure you let me know of anything you 
hear. God knows but there might be something 
in it.” 

“In the affair of Miss Deirdre?” 

“Aye — what else?” 


CHAPTER XVI 


K ALAKA came across the dusty square, her 
grass skirts swaying, the native ornaments of 
bead and tooth, of pearl-shell and clam-shell and 
carved tusk, which she had resumed since her return, 
clinking with the quickness of her walk. She grinned 
unpleasantly at Child and Deirdre, who were sitting 
in the shade of the big temple, and remarked — 
“Fursey, he come.” 

“What!” cried Deirdre, springing to her feet, her 
fate white as the clouds above. Like the sound of 
hang-man’s feet along the corridor, to the prisoner 
trembling in the condemned cell, was this sudden, 
unexpected announcement of Kalaka’s to her. Fur- 
sey! But he had said four days, and it was only 
two! Four days might have given her a chance — 
Conn might have got together a force of the white 
people, and ventured the risk of taking the town by 
storm — surely he would know that it was better than 
the risk of leaving her there ! Child might have 
thought out some scheme, dulled and blurred as his 
mind seemed to be. She herself — But Fursey was 
returning, and there had not even been time — had 
there? She could not be sure — for the hazardous, 
uncertain message of her song to make its way. 
Fursey returning! 

It was late on the afternoon of the day that fol- 
lowed the market. The men had come back, bring- 
308 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 309 

ing with them goods from the tribes of the island 
and the shore — salt in green-leaf packets; dried fish; 
store of sea-shells and turtle-shell for the making of 
native jewellery. The singing of Deirdre’s air still 
went on; it had taken the village like a plague. She 
thought that, if she survived this terrible adventure 
— if she lived to be an old, old woman, in countries 
far away — never would she hear anyone singing 
“Gypsy Lover” without instantly seeing the whole 
strange place — the dark death temple at the end of 
the village, the grove of drum trees, with their 
hideous human faces, in the middle; the groups of 
naked brown men, herding in shadow, their long, 
ever-restless gun-barrels gleaming and moving 
faintly like reed-beds of steel. She would smell, she 
knew, the smell of dust and decay, wood-smoke, pig, 
wet forest that filled the village; would hear the 
thunder-drumming that made horrible the evenings ; 
tremble again, as she had trembled, hiding in a cor- 
ner of the temple, while things unknown, unname- 
able, were being done outside. . . . 

If she got away. 

There had been some chance of that last night. 
Tonight, with Kalaka’s news beating in her pulses 
like some bewildering drug, with Fursey — how near 
— to the town, she knew that there could be almost 
none. 

“When he come?” she asked the girl, breath- 
lessly. 

Kalaka, answering, in a flood of native, was trans- 
lated by Child. Fursey, it seemed, had been sighted 
by the spies of the village, early that morning, com- 
ing across from Wawaka Island. The spies who 
had seen him were tree-top spies, perched on the 
border of the coastal natives’ country. They had 


310 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

called the news to the nearest of the chain that 
stretched, at distances of a mile or so, right up to the 
village. During the course of the morning, the news 
had leaped across a distance that no man could have 
travelled under many hours. Fursey was a good way 
behind it; but they thought he would be there by the 
time the moon was up. 

Thus Kalaka, grinning with malicious delight. 
She was quite aware that Deirdre feared and hated 
Fursey, and the fact seemed to console her, more or 
less, for the neglect of herself that she saw impend- 
ing in the immediate future. Besides — did not na- 
tive custom compel a recent wife to serve an older 
one? Kalaka thought there might be fun, for a 
brown woman charged with hatred against the 
white, in the new arrangement. 

Child, speaking in native, asked her a question. 
She answered it, nodding her head, with the word, 
“Smitti !” 

Smith! Too well Deirdre understood that her 
worst fears were likely to be realized. Fursey was 
coming, days earlier than he had been expected, and 
was bringing with him Smith, the renegade mission- 
ary; Smith, who was qualified to marry them. . . . 

Something must have happened. Fursey had evi- 
dently been scared by some movement on the part 
of the white people. The tale of her drowning, well 
though it had been concocted, might have failed at 
some essential point to convince. ... If that 
were so, he would be doing just what he was doing — 
travelling up hot-foot with the intention of protect- 
ing himself by a forced marriage I 

Deirdre knew — who was better versed in melan- 
choly knowledge of marriage laws than she? — that 
no marriage of hers would hold good in law. But 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 31 1 

where would be the use of telling Fursey this? It 
might sign her own death-warrant. It could not 
save her from him. 

Her limbs seemed to give way under her. She 
dropped on the log, and sat staring, twisting her 
hands together. Conn would come — she knew it. 
But he might come too late. 

Through all the trouble, the thought of saving 
herself by disclosing Conn’s secret never had ap- 
pealed to her as in any way possible, or useful. She 
was not so wildly romantic as to contemplate saving 
the secret of the treasure at the cost of her own life 
or honour. But she had known all along it would 
be no use to tell. Fursey had but dangled freedom 
before her as a bunch of carrots is dangled before 
a donkey’s nose. It was against all his interests to 
let her go, and when had he ever studied anything 
but his interests? 

She might be driven, by terrible means, to the dis- 
closure, once thoroughly in his power, if he were 
certain she would not tell him without force. But 
on such a possibility, she did not dare to dwell. She 
had one thing to think of, one only — how to get 
away. Within the hours — how few! — ^before the 
rising of the moon, lay her last chance. 

Child, his enormous limbs outspread on the 
ground beside her like a fallen tree, looked up, and 
seemed to guess what she was thinking. 

“It can be done,” he said. Kalaka had moved 
off. “I can get you out — if I stay behind myself.” 

“Not to let them kill you? I could*not — ” 

“There isn’t a chance of that. Don’t worry. 
But — if you do get out, it doesn’t mean getting away. 
You don’t know the bush. They wouldn’t chase 
you — ^not the men from this village — if I quiet them. 


312 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

But others might. All the same, you can try — if you 
wish.” 

“What are you going to do?” 

Without immediately answering her question, 
Child said — 

“Kalaka will be easily settled. Look here.” He 
showed her a small gourd bottle with a stopper of 
wood. Uncorking it, and letting a few crimson 
drops fall on the ground, he said — 

“Betelnut — decoction strong enough to blow off 
the head of a buffalo. I’ll catch the little jade, and 
pour it down her neck. She’ll sleep like the dead 
till tomorrow afternoon.” 

“But Fursey — he said he would kill her — ” 

“So he would — if she was on Wawaka. Not here. 
The chief is Kalaka’s brother, and he would murder 
and eat the whole crowd of them. He very nearly 
did it, time Fursey stole her away, but there was 
plenty of payment made, and he quieted down.” 

“If I can get out! — ” cried Deirdre, feeling new 
hope spring up. 

“You’d better have your chance. I can’t do any- 
thing till night time.” 

“But Fursey will be here!” 

“Not till moonrise, eleven o’clock. He didn’t 
leave Wawaka early, and it’s good twelve hours. I 
tell you. I’ll do what I can. You’ve made me re- 
member — all sorts of things. I can believe I was 
once a man, since I’ve met you.” 

“Can’t you go back?” cried Deirdre pitifully, to 
the strange, wild creature, who lay on the ground, 
looking up out of dead eyes into hers. The dead 
eyes turned away, as Child answered her, heavily — 
“Too late.” 

“Keep quiet till then,” he went on presently* 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 313 

“Don’t do or say anything to raise suspicion; it may 
be difficult. Have patience ; we’ll hope for the best.” 

He heaved himself up, lurched across the square 
and disappeared somewhere among the huts. Deir- 
dre was left alone. All round her the natives, loaf- 
ing in the shade with their bamboo pipes and their 
inevitable guns, were singing the air that had taken 
their fancy. It was like a hive of bees, humming in 
tune. The incongruity of the whole thing made her 
feel light-headed. She buried her face in her hands, 
and tried to think. Tonight — tonight! 

What was that? Mindful of Child’s warning, 
she resisted the impulse that beset her, to leap to her 
feet, and listen eagerly. Instead, she listened, with- 
out changing her attitude of despair; listened, but 
with throbbing heart, and ears sharpened almost to 
painfulness. 

Somebody — outside the town — was singing 
“Gypsy Lover.” 

Now this, in view of the fact that the whole tribe 
had taken possession of the song, was not remark- 
able. But what was remarkable was the skilful, 
careful introduction into the air, of fragments from 
another. She could hardly believe her ears, but the 
interpolations did sound like — sound like? Why, 
they were! — scraps from “Your Shadow On My 
Heart.” 

Once this conviction took hold of her, she felt a 
revulsion of spirit so strong that she could have 
burst into tears. Instead, she sat quite still, and 
looked about her. Kalaka, drugged, apparently lay 
sleeping in the shadow of the women’s house. 

Deirdre, trembling all the while lest the malicious 
native girl should wake, lifted her head, and cau- 
tiously at first, but with full voice, as she saw that 


314 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

nobody was noticing, sang a line or two of “Your 
Shadow On My Heart.” The singing in the village 
was beginning to die down; it was the hot hour of 
the day, when most of the natives slept. She paused, 
and listened again. 

There — it was the tune of “Gypsy Lover” with the 
same little fragment from the other song, lightly 
added. Just enough to tell her It was Conn singing, 
and no native. Not enough to give the fact away to 
listening ears. No words, just simple vocalizing. 

She realized that, if Conn were indeed within ear- 
shot, he would never risk drawing the fire of the 
natives on himself, and probably on her, by saying 
anything. That remained for her. Was Kalaka 
asleep? She strolled across, and looked, as she 
passed by, at the plump brown figure lying in the 
shade of the women’s house. If stertorous snores 
were evidence, Kalaka was resting well. Deirdre 
had seen the effects of betelnut often enough; she 
knew that an overdose like that which Child had 
administered would probably hold for a night and 
half a day. No danger there. . . . 

Returning to her own side of the square, she lifted 
her voice, and sang the gypsy song. At the end of 
it, she broke into improvised words, sung to the 
same tune. 

‘‘Can you hear, can you hear, do you understand me? 

He is coming back tonight, when the moon comes up. 
When it’s dark, I will try and get away somehow. 

Stay and wait, do not let them know that you are there.” 

Back to her, from the forest, came the Inevitable 
gypsy song, and then just a line — what was that 
tune? Oh — from “Come Into the Garden, Maud.” 

“I am here — am here at the gate alone.” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 315 

It was quickly vocalized, without words, but Deir- 
dre understood. Conn would be close to the gate, 
after dark. 

‘‘Do not sing — any more — they have almost noticed,” 


she sang carelessly. Some of the men were begin- 
ning to turn their heads and stare. Perhaps they had 
noticed something in the quality of the voice not 
quite like their own. She hoped they had not. 

Nothing remained now but to wait; to hope that 
Child would succeed in his dealings with the men, 
whatever they might be, and that Fursey would not 
come too soon. Once outside the guarded gate of 
the town — once with Steve — she felt she could defy 
the world. Twelve hours of hard travel lay be- 
tween her and civilization, such as Meliasi knew; 
Fursey and his gang were even now on the only 
road — but there was no use crossing bridges before 
you came to them. 

“Nelson used to say,” she reminded herself, “that 
something always had to be left to chance.” 

There was not much food to be had that night; 
only a few cold lumps of yam, and a handful of 
bananas, which Child secured somewhere, and 
brought to her. 

“They’ve got another feast on,” he explained. 
“Saving their appetites.” 

“Won’t you have some?” 

He looked at her oddly, and shook his head. 

She was not hungry, but she ate ; it would not do 
to face the road that night, fasting — the road down 
which she was to go with Steve. The words of her 
own song crept into her mind, and nestled there — 


Si6 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

“To the last long camp of all, when life’s last dusk is 
falling. 

Gypsy lover, gypsy lover. I’ll go with you.” 

Aye and she would. All would be right. She felt 
it; there was a spirit of prophecy abroad in the air 
of this strange night, and it was falling on her, as 
the night itself was falling — gently, surely, irresist- 
ibly. She and Steve would be husband and wife, at 
last. She knew that, as surely as if she had seen the 
altar made ready, the priest standing before it with 
his open book. . . . 

Again the thunder-drumming began, the dance 
swept round the idols. The feast tonight was to 
take place inside one of the houses — the tall house 
at the opposite end from the temple, belonging to 
the chief. She could see the women carrying in bas- 
kets and bundles of food. No one came, tonight, to 
save her from the ugly sight of long, swaddled 
bodies being carried by; she watched it all, with 
quickened breath and hands turned cold by fear. 
Child was not to be seen. 

He came at last, and she scarcely knew him. He 
had taken off his European clothes, and was clad 
almost as the native men — only a cloth round the 
middle, and a raffle of ornamental leaves and feath- 
er's tied to his limbs. She started back with a cry. 
Child looked at her almost vacantly. His eyes, wide 
and glassy, showed that the drug had him under its 
influence again. 

“I came to say good-bye,” was all his speech. 

“Oh, why? — I’ll see you again,” Deirdre man- 
aged to say. There was something in the incident 
that frightened her; she could not say what. 

He did not take the slightest notice. 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 317 

“I came to say good-bye,” he repeated. She 
stretched out her hand, but he only looked at it, and 
made no attempt to take it. 

There was a moment’s silence. He turned his 
back, slowly, and slowly walked away. She saw him 
enter the chief’s great house. There came a tre- 
mendous sound of shouting, and the door was shut. 

It grew dark, grew darker; grew on towards 
moonrise. Deirdre, waiting in an agony, unable to 
make up her mind — for would not those unmoving 
figures of riflemen at the gate turn on her and slay 
her, if she ventured even to approach? — saw a 
movement run through the ranks of the men and 
women who waited outside the shut door of the 
house. For a moment the door opened; there came 
out a sound of savage cheering; something was said; 
a laugh went up. . . . 

The two riflemen at the gate, looking at her, low- 
ered their guns and laid them on the ground. 

Hardly daring to believe she saw right, Deirdre, 
a wild, dishevelled little figure, crept timorously to- 
wards the wolf-mouth gate of the town, doubled her- 
self up, slipped through — the sentries looking all the 
time deliberately away — and found herself on the 
dark, wet track outside. Dazzled still by the flaring 
torches of the town, dazed by the drumming, she 
could not see where she was; she crept forward a 
step or two, with hands outstretched, feeling. They 
touched something live and warm. Before she had 
time to spring back. Conn’s arms were round her, 
holding her as if never again, in life or death, would 
they let her go. 


CHAPTER XVII 


D EIRDRE’S first thought, when released from 
that long embrace, was purely feminine : 
“Thank Heaven he can’t see me!” 

Since the moment when she had been bundled into 
Fursey’s canoe, her appearance had never cost her a 
moment of concern. She had accepted Kalaka’s 
gown, glad to cover herself with greater decency 
than her bathing costume permitted; she had put on 
Fursey’s shoes, rather because she feared the rough 
mountain roads, than because of any dislike to go- 
ing barefoot, like a native or a beggar. She had 
not washed for three days; she had not “done” her 
hair in the same time, save for an imperfect smooth- 
ing out with the Spanish back-comb she wore. And 
she had not troubled at all, over the ragged, dirty, 
unkempt appearance she knew herself to present. 

Now, in a moment, things were changed, and 
even as Conn, his arm round her waist to suport her, 
hurried her along the track, she could not help think- 
ing and planning — how to find a stream before 
broad daylight, and wash her face in it — how to use 
some pool as a mirror, twist up her long masses of 
hair becomingly, rub the worst stains of cocoanut 
and clay out of her poor dress, find a flower, per- 
haps, and place it in her breast. . • . Surely, if 

Steve saw her looking as she knew she must look 
now, he would not love her any more 1 
318 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 319 

As for Conn, two thoughts, while he hurried 
Deirdre away from the neighborhood of the can- 
nibal town, made fierce turmoil in his breast. The 
first was — Fursey. He longed, as he had never 
longed for anything in his life, to kill the little 
scoundrel; to tear his shrieking life out of him with 
ruthless hands, and throw the body into the deep 
seas, there, for the first time in its existence, to be 
made offenceless and pure. The second was Deir- 
dre herself. So far as he could think in that pressed 
journey over the rough road, holding the* girl up 
with all his strength, he was beginning to realize, 
through some deep intuition such as only lovers 
know, that he had wronged her in his thought, when 
he flung away from her that day upon the shore, 
and told her, in bitter mockery, that she might “tell 
her tale to the marines.” Without question, he be- 
lieved it now. He knew that, for his frantic jeal- 
ousy of that student husband of hers, there had been 
no foundation. 

As for Fursey, whatever his ill intentions might 
have been, Deirdre had so far escaped them. Thus 
much she told him, in the short, hurried sentences 
that gave him the history of the last few terrible 
days. 

She was his — all his. But if he had been a little 
less quick to guess the significance of her song, on 
the lips of the mountain men — if he had not been 
able to find the way to the town — if he had been 
even a little later in arriving — ^the best he could 
have hoped for would have been to know that his 
love was wandering, terrified, unprotected, in dark 
forests, full of wild cannibal natives of the bush; 
the worst would have been to find her in Fursey’s 
power. 


320 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

He held her tighter at the thought, and drew her 
on more quickly. 

It was well not to speak too much, in these peril- 
ous places. The New Cumberland native, wander-* 
ing at night in search of enemies had, he well knew, 
a habit of firing at random in the direction of any 
sudden sound. Respect for human life among the 
natives of the New Cumberlands there was, to his 
certain knowledge, none; among the whites, very 
little. 

“If I had the country!” was his sudden thought, 
“how I could tame it!” 

But no one had the country, and the cannibals, 
titular owners, were abroad that night, and Fursey, 
worse than any cannibal, was at that moment mak- 
ing his way towards them on the track, as fast as 
he could go. Conn might, for Deirdre’s sake, have 
reluctantly avoided encounter with him, had it been' 
possible to travel by any other way. It was not pos- 
sible. The dense tropic forest, hard enough to pen- 
etrate in daylight, with the aid of clearing knife 
and axe, was hopeless to travel through by night. 
The track was their only way. 

Now the moon began to rise, showing faintly at 
first through the dense screen of trees, and after- 
wards, taking with one leap the ascent into full air. 
The track was a ribbon of silver, the forest a velvet 
wall. Conn looked anxiously ahead. It would not 
do to be surprised by Fursey. 

“We’ll halt for a minute,” he whispered to Deir- 
dre, totally unconscious after his male fashion, of 
her sensitive shrinking back from observation, now 
that the light had come. “Best to hear him before 
he hears us.” 

“What — ^what are you going to do?” asked the 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 321 

girl anxiously. She felt much as if she had cap- 
tured a thunderbolt, and tied it to her ear. It 
dragged her along — but whither would its wild, un- 
checked, untameable course take it? What dis- 
asters would it let loose ? No thought of begging or 
remonstrance came to her. She knew Conn too 
well. If he was going to kill Fursey, there on the 
road at her feet, he would do it, and no man nor 
woman, God nor devil, could stop him. 

Conn hesitated. He knew what his pounding 
blood desired, cried out for. But — 

“No Red Indian business” rang in his ears. Much 
though he chafed against Blackbury’s restraining 
hand, he respected it; respected tough John Bull 
himself. Blackbury was in the right. Killing was 
murder — after all — even in the New Cumberlands, 
even when punishment could not follow. 

Besides — Deirdrel To kill a man in fight be- 
cause of what he had done to her — what would be 
said? Only too well he knew. 

No, Fursey should live. But it should not be to 
enjoy life; to reign any longer as King upon Wa- 
waka, to carry off women, white and black, and 
brutalize everyone with whom he came in contact. 
Conn had made up his mind. It might be, from 
what Deirdre had told him, that there could never 
be marriage between him and her. That was as it 
must be ; he would not think about it yet. But the 
man who had tried to take her from him — had all 
too nearly done it — would not remain to triumph 
over him. 

As knights of old had been used to do, he loosed 
his lady’s arm, and led her to the side of the road. 

“Get in among the trees,” he told her. “Hide 
till I come back for you.” 


322 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

She did not cling to him with her hands, but her 
eyes, in the waxing moonlight, held him. 

“If you don’t come back ...” she breathed. 

“I shall. But if I don’t, you must hide till morn- 
ing, and try to get down to the coast. Take my 
knife; it’s big enough to be some use.” He buckled 
it round her waist looked at her, made to speak 
again, but shut his lips. He wrung her hand, and 
left her. 

There was the sound of his footsteps, soft and 
cautious, for a minute or two, and then silence. 
The moon climbed higher over the maupei trees. 
Thin snakelike rustlings sounded in the forest. A 
lizard woke and made a chirping noise, like kisses 
falling rapidly. 

“That lizard,” remembered Deirdre, “chirps 
when it hears something that one can’t hear one- 
self. . . . What has it heard?” 

She strained her ears, but could hear nothing — 
nothing, save the crackle of tiny twigs where tiny 
things went walking, and the snake-sounds, and the 
kissing sound of the lizard. 

Then, quite a long time after, came the sound 
of steps upon the track. Conn was returning, alone. 
She saw him, helmet off, and head thrown back, 
to let the night-wind play upon his face. His queer 
Hry hair seemed to be standing almost straight. 
There was a look about him of fires but recently 
quenched; something, it seemed, had blazed up 
fiercely, in the half hour of his absence from 
her, and the scorch of it still lingered. When 
he came close, she saw that one sleeve was torn 
away, and that there was a dark red bruise on 
his cheek. 

“Have you killed Fursey?” she asked, creeping 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 323 


forth into the moonlight. She was afraid of him, 
when he looked like this ; but she loved him — God ! 
she loved him! 

He did not answer her, save by a smile. He 
stretched out his hand to help her from the bank 
by the side of the track. “Come down,” he said. 
“The road is clear.” 

They travelled on again. Conn’s arm supporting 
her. She looked at him once or twice, and saw 
that he was half smiling. She knew he could not 
have smiled like that, if his hands had been stained 
with blood, and her heart took ease. 

They came to a small clearing by the way. The 
moon, now high and bright, poured down into it, 
turning it to a lake of molten silver. Plain to be 
seen in the midst of It was a figure tied up in a 
bundle, and lying on the ground. Two other figures 
stood near It. They were all white men. ^ 

“I suppose you know these gentry,” said Conn. 
“This beauty tied up on the ground Is Mr. Fursey ; 
he’s going to spend the next few weeks in jail In Fiji, 
and the next thousand years in hell. He’s enough 
murders on his conscience — If he had one — to hang 
a dozen men, and I’ll have a schooner full of wit- 
nesses over to Fiji with him, to prove it. We’ll 
start In a week or so, in my boat, and I’ll sail her 
myself.” 

“To Fiji!” 

“To Fiji, to hell or to Connaught — anywhere 
that I can find justice for this brute. If there’s 
no law in the New Cumberlands, that’s a fact that 
works two ways. I can kidnap him and bully the 
witnesses, and do any dashed thing I like, to get 
him hung. These are two of them, but they’re not 
going to Fiji. They have promised me like good lit- 


324 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

tie boys that they’ll carry Fursey down to Meliasi 
for me, on condition of being let off. Fursey can’t 
walk. He’s got a sprained ankle, where he took 
a toss just now, and I’ve an idea one of his wrists 
is broken.” 

“You put my left eye out,” growled one of them, 
whom Deirdre recognized as the wretched Smith, 
the other being the man she had only known as 
“Mac.” 

“Oh, no, my good man,” answered Conn cheer- 
fully. “I leave that sort of thing to Fursey. I 
copped you a good one that’ll mark you for three 
weeks or thereabouts; nothing more. If you knew 
anything about fighting, which I swear you don’t — ” 

“It wasn’t fair play.” 

“What, one to three?” 

“Not when you took us by surprise, and knocked 
put Fursey first blow, and tripped up Mac. I don’t 
call that fighting, that circus stuff.” 

“I told you, you know nothing about fighting, my 
boy. That eye of yours is blind because it’s swelled 
up. As for circus stuff, if there’s any circus about, 
you’re it. Get on, Joey.” He gave him a slight, 
contemptuous kick. Smith, eyeing him furiously, 
picked up his end of the bundle that was Fursey — 
a groaning, complaining bundle it was — and, helped 
by Mac, took his place in front of Conn. Once more 
they started down the track. 

Half-way, when the sun was rising, they made a 
camp by a stream to rest. Conn, who had been 
carrying a little bread-sack, strapped to one shoul- 
der, all night, unslung It now, and brought out a loaf 
and a tin of meat. “I never travel without tucker,” 
he explained. “Good thing I had this.” He shared 
it, Deirdre was glad to see, equally among the four, 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 325 

and gave the groaning Fursey water out of his hel- 
met. She, herself, slipping away, found the pool 
she had been longing for, found a band of broad 
green satiny pandanus leaf to girdle her loose 
dress, found a red bush flower to twist in her hair. 
She washed, and smoothed, and preened herself, 
like one of the pigeons cooing over her head, and 
came out from the forest again a picturesque, if a 
ragged little figure. Conn threw her a glance of 
laughing approval. 

“More than half-way now,” he said. “It’s the 
easiest half, and that cuts distance.” 

Noon came, and found them emerging from the 
forest, with the coast line full in view. They turned 
a corner, and there was Meliasi, huddling on the 
shore; and the tall green islands of Waka, Wawa 
and Wawaka, and the Residency island, and — 

“Oh!” cried Deirdre. “Look, look!” 

Conn was already looking, and so were the 
carriers, Mac and Smith, who had each of them let 
out a sudden oath as they turned the corner of the 
road, and came in sight of the harbour. For there, 
in the deep blue of the anchorage, beyond the tum- 
bling reef, stood out the shape of a tall grey war- 
ship, flying the British flag. 

“Why, she has come after all,” remarked Conn. 
“She’s been expected, and disappointed us so often, 
that one began to believe she wasn’t ever coming. 
This saves me a run to Fiji in that little hooker of 
mine; would have taken a month, I daresay. The 
man-of-war’ll do it in six days, easy. Fursey, you’ve 
got three weeks less to live than you had five min- 
utes ago.” 

“Oh, don’t,” winced Deirdre. Conn only 
laughed. 


326 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

“There’s something going on,” he said presently, 
as they drew nearer. He had amazingly long- 
sighted eyes; the others, although staring hard, 
could make out nothing of note. It seemed as if a 
crowd had collected near the jetty — but a crowd 
always did collect there on the arrival of any ship. 

“What is it?” asked Deirdre, as she saw him star- 
ing, with wide excited eyes. 

“Hurry, you swine!” was all his answer ad- 
dressed to the carriers. He seized Deirdre by the 
arm, and drew her along. “I want to see,” he said. 
“There’s a point close to here — ” They reached 
the point; it was rock, running high and clear of 
the road. Conn leaped up it like a deer, and stood 
for a minute. Then he snatched off his sun helmet 
and swung it wildly round his head, cheering, “Hoo- 
ray, hooray!” 

“Sing, ‘God Save the King,’ Deirdre,” he called 
to her, and started the air himself. 

Deirdre, afraid that the excitement of the night 
had temporarily touched his mind, nevertheless 
joined in, and sang the verse. At the end. Conn 
came down. He still held his helmet, and was wav- 
ing it about. 

“They’ve run up the Union Jack ashore,” he 
cried. “The man-of-war has come to annex. The 
New Cumberlands are ours!” 

“What about France?” demanded Deirdre. She 
had not stayed at the Residency without discovering 
the urgency of that question. 

“Oh, we must have had to pay through the 
nose for her interest — ^big slabs of Africa, or some- 
thing of the kind. Never mind, we can afford It. 
Glorious, glorious ! This is the end of the old days 
In the Cumberlands.” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 32^ 

“If this had happened a year ago, you wouldn’t 
have had all the trouble about your secret,” ob- 
served Deirdre. 

“Oh — that,” laughed Conn. “I forgot! See 
here, you Fursey, and the other swine. Want to 
know what I found? I found pearls — pearls by the 
quart, by the bucket, in a cave right alongside the 
dancing ground, dropped there for centuries 
through the cracks, under the shell-heaps, and pre- 
served by the sea. Hey, what do you think of 
that?” 

“Steve, Steve I” cried Deirdre, convinced now 
that he was really going mad. 

“You wonder why I tell them? Well, this is 
why. You remember the big storm before the 
time I took you down into the cave?” 

“Yes.” 

“It was a very big one, and it brought down 
lots, more than I had seen for a long time. Well, 
that was the last.” 

“Last? Of the pearls?” 

“Yes. Of course I always knew it must end 
some day, as they had only been falling down for 
a certain period, and no more had come from the 
ground above for a long time. But I didn’t think — 
However, the big storm did it; cleaned the place 
right out. Next time I went, there wasn’t so much 
as a necklace left.” 

“Are you sorry?” asked the girl. 

“Can’t say I am; I had my whack out of it, and 
no one ever found out, anyhow. Now let’s crack 
on a bit, if you feel up to it, and get into Meliasi. 
I’m dying to see what’s going on.” 

“Steve,” asked the girl as they neared the town, 
“what does this mean?” She drew her hand across 


328 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


and away from her mouth, with a tearing motion, 
as she had seen Child do in the village. 

“That? It’s the cannibal sign; means — ‘Give 
me a man to eat.’ — ^Why, Deirdre, are you feeling 
tired again? You’re as white as a sheet.” 


CHAPTER XVIII 

‘‘T REGRET extremely,” said the Commander, 
A “that the news should have arrived by this boat. 
Not of course on your account,” he looked towards 
Blackbury; a Frenchman would have bowed, “but 
because it deprives the Imperial Government of 
your services, at this critical and important point in 
the history of the islands.” 

The speech was formal, but it seemed to please 
John Bull. He smiled a little, and drev/ a breath 
that was somewhat like a sigh. 

“Pm rather sorry too — in a way,’^ he allowed. 
“Still — Eve done my bit here; it may be as well 
to have new men for new times. And the place at 
home will want looking after.” 

“You were originally the heir?” asked the Com- 
mander, with courteous interest. 

“Till my uncle married again. No one would 
have thought his family wouldn’t survive an old 
beggar like me. All things come to him. . . . 

Well.” John Bull caught back a small sigh. 

“Your friends will congratulate you.” The Com- 
mander’s tone was less formal than before. “I — 
in fact some of them have already done so, through 
me.” 

“Some?” John Bull, turning his head, looked 
attentive. 

“One at least. A very charming — the Dowager 
329 


330 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

Marchioness of Kirkpatrick, In fact. Quite young 
for a dowager.” 

Blackbury seemed to be working a sum In his 
head. 

“Quite young,” he answered presently. He 
changed the conversation. “This place will take 
some pulling Into order,” he said. 

“Yes,” replied the Commander. The thought 
In his mind, unspoken, was that it might be well 
a younger man should step In. “Of course,” he 
remarked, “the appointment would have been of- 
fered — Is offered, in fact — to you.” 

“I’m obliged. But the Imperial Government 
won’t lose — rather the contrary — if — do I under- 
stand that a recommendation of mine would carry 
weight? 

“The greatest. You have someone In your 
mind?” 

“If he would take It. A man with a large Inde- 
pendent fortune — resident — varsity man — quite 
the—” 

“Do you by any chance mean Mr. Conn?” 

“I do.” 

“I have heard of him. I should think It would 
be — But you understand nothing could be prom- 
ised.” 

“I understand,” said John Bull, nodding his slow 
head, knowing that the matter was as good as set- 
tled. “We could have him in and sound him. But 
of course — no promises.” 

An hour later, someone came tapping eagerly at 
the screen before the open door of Deirdre’s room. 

She was lying down within. It was two days 
now since her return, but the weariness of the long 
strain and hardship she had suffered seemed to 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 331 

have taken hold of her slight body, and she spent 
most of the time resting in her quiet room, blinds 
drawn down, soft sounds of the sea below coming, 
faint with distance, through the open doors. A 
great, dark melancholy was creeping over her, in 
these days of regained safety, that should have been 
so happy. After all — after all — where was the 
use? What was everything in the world worth, 
without the one thing she craved? 

“Can you come out?” asked Conn’s voice. It 
had a new note in it — a tone of elation and excite- 
ment. “Perhaps he has heard something,” she 
thought, and sprang off her bed. “Something” with 
her always meant something about Rogers. She did 
not dare to tell herself what the “something” was 
that she really craved to hear. 

Conn, waiting, drew her to a quiet corner of the 
verandah. 

“What do you think?” he said. “Fve had 
a strong hint that they will make me Administrator 
of the New Cumberlands — ^to do what I like — pull 
the place into order — organize native troops — burn 
out the wasps’ nest there on Wawaka. How do 
you like that?” 

Deirdre, as well as the rest of the house, had 
heard about the chance that was removing Black- 
bury from the islands, and sending him home to. 
take his place as a British land-owner. She had not, 
however, even guessed at the other possibility. Conn 
had. It had never left his mind from the moment 
in which he had heard of Blackbury’s retirement. 
It warmed his very heart; it put the crown ^on every 
ambition of his life. 

To Deirdre, the news came as mingled honey and 
gall. Conn was to be the ruler of the New Cum- 


332 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

berlands — that was right, and entirely as it should 
be. But who was to be his queen? 

She turned white with the pain of the moment, 
but bravely congratulated him. “Oh, I’m glad,” 
she said. “You will make a splendid Administrator 
— and your being independent will help so much.” 

“I should think it will,” agreed Conn, still self- 
absorbed. “I can run my own steamer, if -they 
won’t give me one, and pay my own soldiers. Worth 
having, isn’t it? To write one’s name across the 
map of a new country. I’ll leave the New Cumber- 
lands very different from the state in which I — 
why, Deirdre, what is it?” 

For she was crying — half with the old bitter pain 
of the noose about her neck and half with a new, 
vague feeling that the Cumberlands themselves 
might prove a very formidable rival. Would Conn 
go on caring for a woman he could never marry, 
when he had all this to occupy his mind and his 
ambition ? 

But Conn was quite sure. “Of course, girlie,” 
he said, “you and I will have to run it together. 
Your husband? Oh, we’ll find some way. It’s 
impossible that there can be no way out. Don’t 
lose heart.” He kissed her, and left her, only half 
consoled. 

Late in the afternoon, as she was sitting on her 
verandah, listening vaguely to Mrs. Carbery’s talk, 
which ran much upon the crown coming up in the 
cards, and the ship that meant luck coming in three 
nights in succession, she saw a bush native coming 
slowly, nervously, up the track that kd to the house. 
She watched him, saw him disappear in the direction 
of Blackbury’s official room. It seemed a little 
while — it was in reality some time — ^before he came 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 333 

out again. This time he made his way to the 
kitchen, as native messengers did who were ordered 
to go and eat, pending an answer to their messages. 

Blackbury’s heavy form came round the corner 
of the verandah. Deirdre noticed that he was look- 
ing much younger and brighter this last day or two ; 
she almost hated him for it. She knew that John 
Bull’s old, forgotten story was coming to life, and 
to a happy end. While she — it was hard, very 
hard, to be generous; to rejoice in the happiness of 
another; starving herself, for happiness denied. 

“This parcel has come from inland; the messen- 
ger won’t say how. He is a bushie, and he’s mighty 
scared. I sent him to get some tucker, but he won’t 
have any for fear it might be poisoned,” remarked 
Blackbury. “Will you take it?” 

“For me?” Deirdre held out her hand. The 
parcel was ’tied up in dried banana leaves, and fas- 
tened with cocoanut-fibre string. “What can it be?” 
she asked. 

“Better open it and see,” recommended Blackbury, 
who had his own feelings of curiosity on the matter. 

Out of the bundle, when the strings were cut, 
fell a sheet of bark and a small packet, wrapped in 
red trade cotton — the amulet that Deirdre remem- 
bered seeing on the breast of the strange dead king, 
seated among his court in the temple of the inland 
town. She stared at it as if hypnotized. 

“There’s writing on the bark,” prompted John 
Bull. Deirdre 'took it up. It was fine white inner 
bark, flattened for writing use, and it had been so 
used, a charcoal stick taking the place of pen or 
pencil. The writing began abruptly — 

“This is for Deirdre. I did what I could. I 
hear she escaped. Fursey is caught. He threat- 


334 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 

ened me for years. He knew about my stay in the 
outer islands, and what fell to me there. I had 
climbed up. He threw me down. I shall never 
climb up again now. Their white king was dead. 
They wanted another. The last man refused to eat 
with them.” 

“Oh!” cried Deirdre, letting the bark sheet fall 
to the ground. She understood. 

Blackbury picked it up, and calmly went on. 

“ ‘He died. I do not know how. It was he you 
saw. I opened the packet. Read it. They will 
never kill .me, but you will never hear of me again. 
I am dead.’ ” 

The strange document was signed, in full — “John 
Hamilton CHld, M. A. Oxon.” 

Blackbury, looking at Deirdre’s troubled face, 
took the red packet calmly from her hand and 
opened it. It contained a visiting card; no more. 
The card, which was old and somewhat worn, 
read — 

“Arthur Rogers, 

820, Lower Leeson Street, 

Dublin.” 

“Here,” he cried to Mrs. Carbery, “bring her 
salts — feathers, — something — she’s fainting.” 

For Deirdre, with one look at the card, had 
fallen against the back of her chair. “Hold her 
up,” said Blackbury. 

“Whethen I’ll do no such an’ a thing,” answered 
Mrs. Carbery with fine contempt. “Lay her on the 
flure, sir. Head down. That’s it. Now she’s open- 
ing her eyes. Are ye better, gurl?” 

“All right,” said Deirdre faintly. 

“Daughter of Airyan,” said Mrs. Carbery, in a 
stage whisper. “Was that yer husband?” 


CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 335 

“Yes,” answered Deirdre. “Please let me get 
up, I’m quite all right. It was only the sudden 
shock.” 

“Ye will lay there,” pronounced Mrs. Carbery, 
“till I get ye just the sign of brandy from the din- 
ing room.” She went to fetch it. Deirdre accepted 
the Commissioner’s arm to a lounge. “I’m really 
quite all right,” she repeated. 

“You don’t look,” observed Blackbury, “as if the 
news were likely to break your heart.” 

“He was in an asylum for years,” said Deirdre. 
“I don’t know even now how he got out. He must 
have escaped and changed his name, and somehow 
become sane enough to pass. I — I always thought 
— I couldn’t understand, but there was something 
about him when I met him here — ” 

“Met who here?” cried Blackbury. 

“I thought you knew. Mr. Gatehouse.” 

“Good heavens, my girl, how do you know your- 
self? Gatehouse is absent on leave — he has out- 
stayed it a lot, it’s true — but — ” 

Deirdre, silently, held him out the card. On 
the reverse side was a sentence, written .in faint 
pencil — 

“// anything should happent to me, take this to 
my legal wife, Deirdre Rogers, horn Deirdre Rose, 
I promised never to claim herialive, 

Arthur Rogers, known as George Gatehouse*^ 

She looked at the bit of cardboard that carried 
in its narrow compass the fate of her future life. 
She felt the noose fall from round her neck. , She 
was free. 

Out on the garden walk, the new King of Meliasi 


336 CONN OF THE CORAL SEAS 


was coming to her swiftly. Beside 
old King. In the far mountains, the 
died, unknowingly, for her, sat 
crowned, silent, with the silent dead, 
who had knowingly, died for her, 
lived, passed into silence. 


her stood the 
King who had 
throned and 
And the man 
and who still 
















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